Nigeria has left ‘emergency ward,’ targets $1trn economy by 2030 — Tinubu

President Bola Tinubu

PRESIDENT Bola Tinubu stated that Nigeria’s economy has moved “from stabilisation to shared prosperity,” citing non-oil exports above $6 billion, external reserves of about $55 billion, and a target of a $1 trillion economy by 2030.

Speaking at the public presentation of Economic Diversification and Structural Transformation in Nigeria: Past, Present and Future, authored by Abdulmumin Kofa, Tinubu said the country had abandoned “cosmetic remedies” for what he called the “hard road of surgery.”

According to him: “For too long, Nigeria’s story was a song sung in a single note. We were a nation of boundless promise tied to a single product, our budget, our currency and the livelihoods of millions rising and falling with the tides of a distant oil market. We floated on the fragile illusion of oil wealth while the foundations beneath us crackborders.

”When I took the oath of office, I did not inherit a calm sea; I inherited a gathering storm: a collapsing naira, debt service that swallowed nearly all our revenue, depleted reserves, a fuel subsidy that bled our treasury dry, and factories falling silent as industries and jobs fled across our borders.

“We chose reform over ruin. We removed the fuel subsidy. We unified the exchange rate. These were not easy decisions, and I know the weight they placed on every household. But they were necessary, and today the pain is yielding its promise.”

He stated that non-oil activities now account for about 96 percent of Gross Domestic Product, while non-oil exports have crossed $6 billion, which he described as the highest in Nigeria’s history.

Tinubu also said external reserves had risen to about $55 billion, representing “more than 14 months of import cover,” and that non-oil revenue had grown from N13.63 trillion in 2023 to N16.4 trillion in the first half of 2026.

The President said government alone cannot build a $1 trillion economy, adding that wealth must be created by enterprises that “invest, innovate, manufacture and export.

“Our duty is to clear the path before them, that is why our 2025 budget introduced a first-of-its-kind De-risking Framework to draw in private capital, which we expect to provide 86 percent of the investment our 2030 goal demands.”

He said the administration was harmonising taxes and ending “the menace of multiple taxation.

“We cannot tax our way into prosperity; we must produce our way there,” Tinubu said.

The President said the administration had “fought for Mambilla,” winning a $3.38 billion arbitration at the International Chamber of Commerce in Paris and freeing “a project held hostage for more than nine years.”

He added that Geregu Power was moving to raise its capacity to 1,300 megawatts, while the Port Harcourt and Warri refineries are “stirring back to life.”

On infrastructure, Tinubu listed the Kano–Katsina–Maradi railway, Lagos–Calabar Coastal Highway, Sokoto–Badagry Superhighway, Abuja–Kaduna–Kano Expressway, East–West Road, Ibadan–Ife–Ilesa Expressway, Port Harcourt–Enugu and Enugu–Onitsha expressways, and the restoration of Carter Bridge.

He said 52 per cent of legacy highway mileage is in the North and 48 percent in the South.

“We are building fairly and deliberately, so that no zone is left behind and no citizen is a stranger to opportunity,” he said.