How resilience, patriotic endurance of Nigerians kept Tinubu’s economic reforms alive – Expert

A policy think tank, the Independent Media and Policy Initiative (IMPI) has noted that but for the historic resilience and patriotic endurance of Nigerians, President Bola Tinubu’s bold programmatic and economic agenda would have collapsed.

By resisting the temptation to revert to unsustainable populism, citizens have provided the bedrock stability required for these reforms to mature, IMPI said in a policy statement released by its Chairman, Dr Omoniyi Akinsiju.

The statement, “Nigerians as Actual Executors of Tinubu’s Reforms as Economy Transit from Consumption to Productivity’ released in Abuja, Akinsiju said the success and long-term sustainability of the economic reforms were profoundly dependent on the Nigerian public.

Nigerians, he said, functioned simultaneously as the “primary shock absorbers, the ultimate arbiters of accountability, and the engine of behavioural realignment required for a market-driven economy’’.

“Rather than being passive spectators, we have observed the role of Nigerians in three critical dimensions in the sacrifice phase of bearing the immediate structural shock; enforcing fiscal accountability and the Social Contract; and the driving behavioural shifts and local productivity.

“The most immediate and painful role Nigerians have played is absorbing the massive inflationary and cost-of-living shocks triggered by orthodox economic corrections.

“By enduring the immediate spiralling costs of transportation, food, and energy following the removal of fuel subsidy and the floating of the Naira, the public has effectively provided the  “fiscal breathing room” the government needed to prevent a sovereign default, and rebuild external reserves.

“The sheer resilience of Nigerian households and MSMEs (Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises) in adapting to these harsh macroeconomic realities has kept the economy functioning, and prevented widespread structural collapse during the hyper-inflationary peaks of 2024 and 2025,’’ he explained.

He explained also that for market reforms to succeed, global investors and local citizens alike must see that saved revenues are being utilized transparently and that  Nigerians play a vital role here as enforcers of the social contract.

Through civil society advocacy and public discourse as well as social media engagements, he explained that Nigerians consistently demanded that the trillions of Naira saved from subsidy removal be visibly channeled into tangible infrastructure, healthcare, and human capital development rather than bureaucratic waste.

Akinsiju also explained that long-term economic stability could not rely on central bank interventions or foreign portfolio investments alone, but required structural shifts in how Nigerians produced and consumed.