OPINION: My predictions for 2025

DO not ask me whether I am now also among the prophets as was curiously inquired of someone else in the Good Book. This shock of a development was recorded in 1 Samuel chapter 10 verse 11. I will take the version or translation or adumbration of the Message Bible. It said: “When Saul and his party got to Gibeah, there were the prophets, right in front of them! When those who had previously known Saul saw him prophesying with the prophets, they were totally surprised. What’s going on here? What’s come over the son of Kish? One man spoke up and said, ‘Who started this? Where did this people come from? That’s how the saying got started, Saul among the prophets! (Is Saul also among the prophets?). Who could have guessed?”. I may not have really been called to the ministry of prophecy but I am also a prophet of sorts. But the more important thing is that in Nigeria you do not need to be a schooled prophet to predict what will happen tomorrow, the next day or the day after. I know that prediction and prophecy are not one and the same thing, but I will leave those who like to split hairs to worry about the distinctions and differences.

For our purpose today, the last day of this troubled year, I will be peeping into my crystal ball and I will treat whatever I see that will happen in Nigeria in 2025 as a prophecy. So I will advise that you do not deprive yourself of the prophet’s portion through unbelief. Here we go. In 2025, I see the country implementing two distinct and separate national budgets simultaneously. Unless Nigerians pray very hard, I see the number of budgets climbing to three towards the end of the year. Whether two or three budgets end up being implemented by the All Progressives Congress political party led federal government, it will still be an improvement on 2023/2024 fiscal year when, at a time, three and half budgets were being implemented. As it is the case right now, I predict that by this time next year, the henchmen of the government will not bother to give a coherent account of the performance, or better still, lack of performance of the expiring fiscal document or documents.

From my crystal ball it has been shown clearly to me that the 2025 budget will be passed by the national assembly and signed into law by the president of Nigeria, Alhaji Bola Ahmed Tinubu, before April. The delay in passing the budget will not be down to the scrutiny of the document by senators and representatives. The delay will be down to two factors: one, for them to have sufficient time to pad the budget to line their pockets, and two,to create the impression that they are conducting due diligence. I predict and prophesy that the 2025 fiscal document will be riddled with hanging monetary provisions: allocations for building farm settlements which will be under the aviation and aerospace ministry; budgetary provisions for the repair of highways which contracts will be awarded to crude oil prospecting companies; funds for space exploration which will be domiciled in the newly created ministry of livestock development; and, money inserted in the ministry of agriculture which is expected to be used to build and install solar lights on Lagos -Ibadan expressway. Budgetary allocations for the construction of new classroom blocks in our Unity Schools will be in the name of one obscure restauranteur whose eatery is not registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission; money will be allocated to a community development association in Mgbidi in Oru West local government area of Imo state for the kitting of the national youth service corp members nationwide. It’s our prediction that this will be the complexion of the 2025 national budget. Those who may not like the look and the taste and the texture of the fiscal document should be free to ‘go to court’. The pockmarks and abracadabra budgeting will continue next year and Budgit, SERAP and other anti-graft kindred spirits go scream and shout taya. These watchdogs have yet to realise that they are talking to rulers who have ingrained witchcraft spirit, the type that whispered to them to remove petrol subsidy and devalue the Naira at the same time last year without considerations for the deleterious fallouts.

I prophesy that nothing significant will happen with the claim by the regime that it is working to diversify the economy. The Naira value of non-oil exports will increase in a phenomenal manner. But the significant increases will be due to the illusion of money. In dollar terms, the value of non-oil exports will be lower, or it will at best be at the same level with that of Muhammadu Buhari. And there’s nothing complementary with any regime’s performance being compared with Buhari’s, who until now was Nigeria’s worst president. Bad as it is, the Naira will continue to be unstable and unsettled, and will continue to bleed. The posturing of the central bank of Nigeria is just that – posturing. The claims of accretion to the foreign reserves is a ruse. That’s why the CBN is loathe to speak to the structure and tenor of the foreign reserves. The devil is in the details. So there will be no sustainable reprieve for the Naira. Indeed as we wrote this last weekend, Afrinvest took the thunder out of our prophecy. It projected in its latest study that the Naira will depreciate to N1,804/$1 at the official Forex window in 2025. Afrinvest said that it anticipates “that exchange rate volatility would persist in 2025, albeit at a modest pace. Our prognosis is hinged on the belief that the CBN would be constrained from adequately meeting market demand on a sustained basis, as the recent FX reserves accretion was largely driven by inflows from inorganic sources, including those with stringent conditions on usability”. The title of the report, Beyond The Rhetorics: Transforming Reforms to Tangibles, should not be lost on Nigerians.

Under Buhari over 133 million Nigerians were reported by the government’s national bureau of statistics (NBS) to be in the grips of dimensional poverty. The agency has studiously refrained from issuing further reports on this under Tinubu. In light of the punishing economic policies of the extant regime any further such reports will unsettle this administration and set the alarm bells ringing. However, the NBS recently said that about 53% of Nigerian children are dimensionally poor. A peek into the ramifications of dimensional poverty will help us to appreciate how dire the circumstances of Nigerians are. Dimensional poverty is a concept that describes a state of deprivation or scarcity that extends beyond traditional measures of poverty such as income or material possessions. It encompasses the totality of well-being, including limited access to financial resources, income and employment opportunities. It also involves social connections, relationships and community support. It includes environmental dimensions such as limited access to clean air, water, sanitation, and other environmental resources. There’s also a psychological aspect of dimensional poverty which includes mental health issues, stress, anxiety, and lack of emotional well-being. Spiritual dimension extends to disconnection from one’s spiritual or religious beliefs, values, and practices, while educational dimension involves limited access to quality education, skills training, and personal development opportunities.

Furthermore, poor physical health, limited access to healthcare services, and inadequate nutrition as well as disconnection from one’s cultural heritage, traditions, and values form critical pillars of dimensional poverty. How many Nigerians are not affected or afflicted by one or more of these issues? Dimensional poverty recognises that poverty is not just about economic scarcity but also about the lack of opportunities, resources, and capabilities that can affect an individual’s or community’s overall well-being. The core of the concept is that dimensional poverty acknowledges that poverty is a multifaceted issue that cannot be addressed by a single solution. It requires a holistic approach by policy makers to overcome. Above everything else, it is important to recognise that poverty is not just an economic issue but a human rights concern. Many previous rulers of our country have been unable to recognise this, and the present rulers will not act differently in 2025. So, next year dimensional poverty will not be properly recognised and steps taken to address it to ensure that a more equitable and just society where everyone has access to the resources and opportunities they need to thrive would be created.

The only way that the ruling APC knows how to grow the Nigerian economy is by accumulating debts. Therefore, I prophesy that both the domestic and external debt stocks of the country will continue to tick upwards in 2025. Buhari kept borrowing in the name of Nigeria, and then he resorted to mortgaging the country’s crude oil for cash for immediate squandering. Tinubu as he promised during the 2023 campaigns continued the borrowing spree without let. The profile of his borrowings from the World Bank alone reads like this: June 9, 2023, $750m for the power sector (the country is still in darkness suffering from acute energy deficit in spite of the prohibitive cost); June 27, 2023, $500m for women empowerment; July 2023, $800m to cushion the effects of petrol subsidy removal; September 2023, $700m for girls education; December 14, 2023, $750m for renewable energy; $500m to enhance rural access and agricultural marketing; June 13, 2024, $1.5bn for economic stabilisation reforms: June 13, 2024, $750m for resource mobilization reforms; September 2024, $1.57bn for health, education, and sustainable power sectors; October 2024, $500m for sustainable power and irrigation for Nigeria (SPIN) initiative; and, this December, $500m to boost rural access and agricultural marketing in Nigeria. This does not include borrowings from other sources, and this regime is less than two years in office.

prophesy that the national assembly will pass the tax reform bills in 2025 after Tinubu had made concessions to pacify sections of the seemingly implacable north. The measured climb down will be political, not economic, because the president has been in the campaign mode for 2027. However, he will look for ways to circumscribe the concessions. From tomorrow which is the first day of 2025, President Tinubu will continue the Yorubanization of appointments into sensitive and critical offices of the federation, the Lagos non-indigene Yoruba, of course. In this regard, I predict that the next chief executive officer of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) will be a Yoruba. That will be the culmination for full occupation of the country’s financial and revenue generating agencies of the federal government. The security angle is almost sealed with Yoruba Police and Army chiefs.

In 2025, I prophesy that state governors will devise the means to continue stealing the federal accounts allocations of the local governments in spite of the weird financial autonomy awarded the councils by the Supreme Court at the instance of Tinubu. I predict that the national assembly will work hard to impose on the ‘Independent’ National Electoral Commission (INEC) the conduct of local government elections. Subsequently, the councils will be infested with the gargantuan corruption of INEC. During the year, Tinubu’s refrain about his wonder-working economic reforms will become louder in spite of the evidence before Nigerians. He, and his co-travellers, will insist by 2025 that those who would not see the light at the end of the tunnel are either blind or mischievous or both. But we know those who are suffering from optical illusion – they are our thoroughly wicked rulers. They are seeing nothing, and they know it. In 2025 judges will continue to harvest bribes to pervert justice; the police, army, customs and others’ road blocks (extortion plazas) from Sagamu-Aba will not decrease; governments at all levels will do nothing about internally displaced persons (IDPs) across the country; and, deaths occasioned by food stampedes will not abate. In all, Nigeria’s ranking on the global misery index will deteriorate further in 2025. There will be no change in Nigeria’s standing as the global capital of poverty. It has occupied that status since 2019. Let us, Nigerians, intensify to do what we know how best to do: PRAY, instead of holding our rulers to account. Happy New Year.

AUTHOR: UGO ONUOHA

Articles published in our Graffiti section are strictly the opinion of the writers and do not represent the views of Ripples Nigeria or its editorial stand.

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