ABUJA – The N27.5 trillion budget for the 2024 fiscal year that President Bola Tinubu presented to the National Assembly has been characterized by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as deceptive, stifling, and hopeless.
The party added that it is a great disservice that, if approved, will suffocate Nigerians even more and send the country into even deeper economic despair and hopelessness.
The party further stated that the N750/$ is suffocating and that there is no mechanism for economic recovery in the budget.
The PDP also referred to President Tinubu’s claim that the budget is a Budget of Renewed Hope as concocted, unfounded, and misleading in a statement released by Hon. Debo Ologunagba, the party’s spokesman. The budget lacks any real measures to boost the economy, generate employment, address the manufacturing and productive sectors that are in a state of collapse, address the deficiencies in human capital development, and address the declining life expectancy of Nigerians.
The party declared: “The 2024 budget is chock-full of highly inflated figures, duplicated items, and several false statistics, including claims of a worldwide increase in inflation rate as a pretext for an upcoming agonizing hike in taxes and interest rates that will harm our productive sector.
“It is evident that the proposed 2024 budget, with its substantial provisions for the president and leaders of the All Progressives Congress (APC), is intended to further mortgage our country and strangle the already impoverished Nigerian population. This budget is based on and expected to be funded by multilateral and bilateral foreign loans as well as increased taxes on Nigerians.
“Given the stated outstanding debt and proposed borrowing, which is primarily targeted to finance consumption, luxury appetite, and debt servicing, the budget framework with respect to recurrent expenditure vote of N9.9 trillion, capital expenditure vote of N8.7 trillion, and N8.25 trillion for debt services is unsustainable and unreallizable.”
The party stated that the Tinubu-led APC government is completely disconnected from the realities of life faced by Nigerians and is lacking in ideas, as evidenced by the lack of specific and verifiable action plans to revitalize the manufacturing, energy, agricultural, and education sectors—the main drivers of any economy.
The president’s statement in the budget speech that his government has “adopted a naira to US dollar exchange rate of N750 per US dollar for 2024” is causing the party great concern, the party said.
The party declared: “This is a blatant acknowledgement of the APC administration’s inability, incapacity, and lack of direction to manage and expand the economy in a way that strengthens the national economy, productivity, and competitiveness in the global market.
“It has further demonstrated that the president’s and government officials’ repeated claims of a monetary policy to support the naira have been a shady tactic, consistent with the APC’s actions over the previous eight and a half years.
“President Tinubu has further plunged our economy into a deep hole, weakened our productive sector, destroyed the purchasing power of Nigerians and the ability of the youth to be creative by adopting a defeatist N750 per US dollar exchange rate. He also recognized that it will be nearly impossible for Small and Medium Enterprises as well as startups to access capital under such a suffocating budget.”
The party stated that every responsible leadership seeks to uphold and protect the country’s currency, lamenting the fact that the Tinubu-led administration has given the country’s pride and currency over to the whims and avarices of the so-called “market forces.”
