Tinubu inherited dead economy – Governor Soludo

Governor of Anambra State, Charles Chukwuma Soludo, has said the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu took over a “dead economy” from his predecessor.

Former president Muhammadu Buhari served from 2015 to 2023. He handed over to Tinubu on May 29, 2023.

Soludo blamed worsening economic realities on past violations of the Central Bank of Nigeria establishment law, which bars deficit financing above five per cent of prior year revenues.

The former CBN Governor made the remark on Thursday during an interview on Channels TV programme, Politics Today while analysing the naira’s decline under the new government.

He argued that from a macroeconomic standpoint, the Tinubu regime inherited an economy already beyond revival before it assumed office.

Soludo said; “We explicitly put into the law that you can’t grant the Federal Government more than five per cent of the previous year’s actual revenue. And that so granted must be retired by the end of the year in which it was granted. And when the Federal Government fails to retire, the Central Bank is forbidden by that law from further advancing ways and means. That was the law 2007 Act of the Central Bank.

“But we sat all of us Nigerians watching the CBN illegally and brazenly violating that Act year on year and kept on printing money. That is when advance money is backed by nothing; you just credit the Federal Government with trillions N 4 trillion, N10 trillion, N15 trillion and we keep going.

“I said it before. This particular government inherited a dead economy from a microeconomic point of view, this government inherited a dead horse that was seen standing but people didn’t know that it was dead. I think it’s important for Nigerians to understand this.”