President Bola Tinubu disclosed on Tuesday that Nigeria will allocate roughly $11.6 billion toward debt servicing in 2026. That sum represents approximately half of the country's projected revenue for the year.
Tinubu blamed an unjust global financial system for stunting Africa's economic growth. He spoke during Nigeria's national address at the Africa-France summit held in Kenya.
The summit brought together leaders from more than 30 African nations. French President Emmanuel Macron and Kenyan President William Ruto co-hosted the gathering.
Earlier this September, Tinubu had warned the United Nations that the international system must reform. He cautioned that failure to do so risked rendering global institutions irrelevant.
Tinubu noted that Africa's manufacturing sector accounts for less than 2 percent of global value addition. Despite decades of independence, the continent remains locked in an extractive economic pattern.
"We export raw minerals, crude oil, and agricultural commodities, and we import processed goods at a premium," the president observed. "This pattern is not an accident."
Nigeria has undertaken significant domestic reforms in recent years. The government removed fuel subsidies, unified the exchange rate, and recapitalized banks with over $3.4 billion.
Tinubu emphasized these were sovereign decisions, not externally imposed requirements. Nigeria also exited the Financial Action Task Force grey list, he noted.
These steps have produced measurable results for the economy. Debt-to-GDP ratio is now projected to decline to 32.3 percent by 2026.
External reserves have strengthened to $45.5 billion, according to the president. Investor confidence in Nigeria has also rebounded.
Yet even reforming nations face obstacles under the current financial system, Tinubu argued. Every dollar spent on debt interest is money not invested in critical sectors.
"That's a dollar that did not go into our steel sector, our textile mills, our agro-processing plants, or our digital industries," he said. It represents capital denied to Nigerian engineers and affordable factory power, he added.
African borrowing costs are dramatically higher than those in developed economies. Tinubu posed a stark question to world leaders assembled before him.
"How can an African manufacturer compete when the cost of borrowing in our nations is five to ten times higher?" he asked. "How can we build cross-border industrial value chains when infrastructure projects face financing gaps?"
Tinubu stressed that answering these questions requires structural change. The international financial architecture must be fundamentally restructured, he insisted.
According to him, Africa needs access to affordable capital for its industries. Massive illicit financial flows must be addressed, and policy constraints on African nations must end.
Developed nations never accepted such constraints when building their own industrial bases, Tinubu noted pointedly. Africa should not be forced to accept them now.
Nigeria does not approach these discussions as a supplicant nation, the president declared. It comes as a country committed to meaningful, difficult reform.
But reform alone cannot solve problems created by an unequal global system. Real change requires the international community to acknowledge and address structural inequities.
