A Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Abubakar Yusuf, who represented Taraba Central senatorial District in the National Assembly from 2015 to 2023, has pointedly declared that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s economic policies and implementation strategies are failing to yield the desired results.
This is as he particularly criticised the practice of poor releases of funds and a reliance on deficit financing which he noted have crippled budget performance for years.
Senator Yusuf, who stated these when he featured on Channels Television programme ‘Politics Today’ on February 12, 2026, specifically dismissed what he described as “the effectiveness of Tinubunomics,” stressing that it is not just working.
In the words of Yusuf; “For me, it is not working. I am a member of the APC. I would be the last person to hide the facts.”
The former lawmaker noted that while the government may be diligent, its policy framework is fundamentally and completely a mismatched with the needs of Nigeria.
Yusuf, who served in the Senate between 2015 and 2023, specifically criticised what he termed; “the abrupt termination” of the fuel subsidy on President Tinubu’s inauguration day without prior and adequate planning.
“I am one of those who say President Asiwaju ought to have waited. Not on the day he was sworn in to say subsidy is gone. On what basis?” he questioned.
The position by Yusuf marked a significant departure from members of the ruling APC with regards to internal critique of the Tinubu-led administration.
The former lawmaker tasked the administration to prioritize consultation by ensuring that members of the Federal Executive Council sit with the President and proffer concrete and meaningful advice to the President as against hypocrisy and blind loyalty.
Yusuf also took a swipe at the nation’s “envelope” budgeting system, which he noted forces agencies to budget before coming up with concrete plans.
According to him; “The envelope system we have been operating has been, you budget before you plan. That has been a major issue.
“Allocating funds without aligning them to specific development goals ensures failure: If you give me an envelope which is contrary to my plan, whether it is plus or minus, there is no way I am going to implement my plan. It is bound to fail,” he stressed.
“We could not meet 60 percent of our capital budget in all these years. No releases. If you make a budget and the release is very poor, there is no way the budget will be executed,” he stated.
Yusuf further said that Nigeria’s financial planning consistently falls into a cycle of underperformance, emphasising that the nation’s budget ought to have been a surplus budget as against all budgets experiencing deficit budgets financing.
