Tinubu’s Compassion Deficit: From Promises To Provocations

By Ikeddy ISIGUZO*

When President Bola Ahmed Tinubu speaks these days, it is obvious that his frequent travels have created a different country for him, one he mistakes for Nigeria. The projects he claims to have executed could well be in another nation.

The country that Tinubu and his top aides discuss, dismissive of its challenges, cannot be the Nigeria of 2025. They talk about a country of their imagination.

Our most pressing challenges stem directly from Tinubu’s compassion deficit – he seems unconcerned with the well-being of Nigerians.

He “keeps” his promises by making new ones or offering incoherent responses. His Independence Day Anniversary speech mirrored this absence of compassion, a loss of touch with the Nigerian reality, and an exaggerated sense of importance for a presidency that dedicates its attention to serving a select few Nigerians and then extrapolating their experiences to represent the whole nation.

Tinubu said in his October 1st nationwide address, “We chose the path of tomorrow over the comfort of today. Less than three years later, the seeds of those difficult but necessary decisions are bearing fruit.” Which fruit? The fruit is reflected in statistics that bear no relation to how Nigerians are struggling to make a living.

Nigerians are better off today than in 1960, Special Adviser to President Bola Tinubu on Economic Affairs, Tope Fasua, echoed. We are expected to believe him. His circumstances have certainly improved since his appointment. And he is, indeed, a Nigerian.

Sadly, his elevated circumstances, which have resulted in more Naira in his pocket and more opportunities, lead him to believe that all Nigerians share his experience.

Political appointees like him argue about improved infrastructure when discussing projects that are still in their infancy, making it seem as though they are capable of leading Nigeria in any direction, despite all the uncertainties involved.

These promoted projects are, in fact, major drains on the economy. Lacking transparency and burdened by humongous, inexplicable costs, the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway and Badagry-Sokoto Expressway serve as glaring examples of the vision of an uncaring government—a government that prioritises a supposed fantastic future over the pestilent present.

A great future? What about the immediate and short-term needs of the people? How do we survive today while Tinubu builds this future, which we are so often reminded is for unborn generations?

Does this focus on the future render the present unnecessary? Do we simply move immediate challenges into the future, all to accommodate Tinubu’s poor purpose and lethargic responses to promises that he continues to make to mask his lax leadership?

On Friday, on Channels Television, Fasua stated, “For those who try to compare Nigeria to 1960, in many ways we are living a better life now. In 1960, just after independence, we had a whole lot of people, of course, living in villages and so on.

“It was when we took over government as nationals ourselves that we started moving from villages to Lagos, to Ibadan, to Kaduna, to Enugu and all of that, and then that created a kind of urban poverty, because people found themselves in those cities and they were out of sorts as to what to do.”

Turning to the present, “The current administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is saying that, look, we are not going to really be sharing money, we want to do something that takes us on a different trajectory, that paints a new picture, that prepares even our children and unborn children for a better life than what we have had,” Fasua said.

Here is also the present: Edo State, a proudly All Progressives Congress (APC) territory, is barely accessible. It has some of the worst federal roads in Nigeria.

Minister of Works, Dr. Dave Umahi, last week visited the Benin-Warri bypass—which is slightly better than the Auchi-Benin Expressway—with Governor Monday Okpebholo. Umahi expressed shock at the state of the road, saw vehicles that were stuck or had overturned, and praised President Tinubu’s transformative infrastructure projects. He announced that a solution was on the way and that Tinubu’s reinforced concrete technology roads would have a 50 to 100-year lifespan.

At an Independence Day Anniversary state dinner, Umahi told those who made it to the table, “Mr President has directed that 100 kilometres by two lanes of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway must now pass through Edo. This is a special gift to the people of Edo.”

Rounds of applause filled the room.

Umahi revealed that Tinubu was “impressed by Governor Okpebholo’s commitment to infrastructure” and that the State must benefit as a “reward for loyalty, leadership, and performance.”

Okpebholo gushed, “The President treats me like a son. Whenever we request support, he responds with express approval. This 100km coastal highway is proof of his love for our State.”

How will this “special gift” help vehicles stuck in the mud on roads around Edo State to continue their journey? Or will they simply wait for the coastal road? Is this “special gift” an example of the instant approval that Tinubu gives to requests from Edo State, as an excited Okpebholo has suggested?

Those who have their eyes on the cost and completion of the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway should note the addition of 100 kilometres to uncharted parts in Edo State. They can join in wondering if the Highway will ever be built and what the final cost will be.

Bayo Onanuga, Tinubu’s Senior Special Assistant, Media, is among those who presently live in Tinubu’s promised future.

“The Naira has virtually stabilised. Investor confidence in our economy has been restored, and investors are betting on Nigeria. In plain language, the nation has turned the corner. And our people have started reaping the gains of the bold reforms instituted by the Tinubu administration.

“We can go on and on, reeling out the many macroeconomic gains of the Tinubu administration,” he trumpeted while reacting to reports that former President Goodluck Jonathan was joining the 2027 presidential race.

Who turned the corner? Did the President and his lieutenants turn the corner without the people?

With three months left in the year, we have yet to start funding the 2025 capital budget. Even the 2024 capital budget has not been completed.

Does the National Hospital, which Tinubu does not use, speak for our healthcare? Patients seeing a doctor are required to bring their own hand gloves or cotton wool; otherwise, they will not be seen. The hospital cannot afford to provide these, even after collecting a consulting fee from patients.

Hospital floors are mopped with just water, without detergents or disinfectants, heightening the chances that patients and visitors could pick up infections.

The National Hospital in Abuja, a supposed prime health facility, partially tells the story of the application of the funds the President claims to have saved from his deft management of the economy to a blooming doom that only those living on subsidy, like him, cannot feel, because their access to unimaginable resources has drained their compassion and left them incapable of making inclusive decisions.

Tinubu sounds more annoying daily. He also sounds like he has finished a four-year race that is just four months past the halfway mark.

He is distracted by concentric circles of conspiracies about winning a second term, a gross aversion to transparency, indifference to injustice, and a selective awareness of Nigeria’s drift toward uncertainties.

When you add these to his compassion deficit, you will realise, in case you have not, why he is turning the corner with statistics, not with the people.

• ISIGUZO is a major commentator on minor issues.