Obasanjo: Tinubu’s naira devaluation has made every Nigerian poorer

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has blamed the steep fall of the naira under President Bola Tinubu for deepening poverty in Nigeria. He said the devaluation had made “every Nigerian” poorer.

Obasanjo spoke on Wednesday at the Financial Times Africa Summit 2026 in London, as reported by TheCable and Daily Trust.

“And overnight, you devalue the currency by 300 percent,” he said. “The naira went from N500 to a dollar to N1,500 to a dollar.”

According to the former president, the effect was to make “every Nigerian poor by 300 percent”. It also turned Nigeria into “the poverty capital of the world”, the country with more poor people than any other, he said.

“You cannot say to me that that is good for Nigeria,” Obasanjo said.

The Presidency could not be immediately reached.

A move from N500 to N1,500 per dollar is acutually a 200 per cent rise in the exchange rate, and it means the naira lost about two-thirds of its value against the dollar.

Nigeria was also first called the world’s “poverty capital” in 2018, under President Muhammadu Buhari, after the World Poverty Clock estimated that it had overtaken India in the number of people living in extreme poverty.

Tinubu’s economic overhaul began soon after he took office. In his inauguration speech in May 2023, he declared that the petrol subsidy was gone, and pump prices and transport fares rose sharply. In June 2023, the Central Bank of Nigeria merged the country’s multiple exchange rates and let the naira trade more freely. The currency then fell steeply.

The government says the reforms were needed to end costly distortions in the fuel and currency markets, free up money for public spending and attract foreign investment. However, the changes caused record inflation, higher import costs and a cost-of-living squeeze on households and businesses.

Obasanjo has criticised Tinubu’s administration before. His latest remarks are likely to add to the debate over who has borne the cost of the reforms.