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Nothing to celebrate! Okonjo-Iweala’s comments not endorsement – ADC
It is dishonesty, for All Progressives Congress (APC) government of President Bola Tinubu, and its foot-soldiers to go to town, trumpeting that Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Director General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), has fully endorsed the manner Nigeria is currently being run.
The African Democratic Congress (ADC), while weighing in on the comments made on Thursday, by the WTO boss, shortly after a private meeting with Tinubu at the State House in Abuja, accused the government of cherry-picking the issue by choosing instead to celebrate the headlines instead of the actual content of the comments.
Okonjo-Iweala, former Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, who acknowledged the government’s efforts in “stabilising” the nation’s economy, stressed that what was remaining was to ensure growth and to create social safety nets to mitigate the suffering being experienced by Nigerians at the receiving end of its policy reforms.
She said: “The President and his team have worked hard to stabilise the economy. The reforms have been in the right direction. The next step is growth, and alongside that, building social safety nets so those feeling the pinch of reforms can get support.”
Against the backdrop of the general interpretation being given to the comment as a full endorsement of the Tinubu’s running of the country, the party which conveyed its pushback through Bolaji Abdullahi, its spokesman, accused the government of seeking validation rather than focusing on the job at hand.
The full statement read: “Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala’s recent comments on President Tinubu and the Nigerian economy have been seized upon by government officials and their media allies as if their scandalous implementation of hard reforms — which have condemned the majority of Nigerians to absolute poverty and destroyed millions of jobs — had received endorsement by the oracle herself. This is not correct.
“Dr Okonjo-Iweala knows that a stable economy is one that is growing in real terms, led by jobs and productivity. She knows that a stable economy is one that is able to guarantee minimum standards of living for the people. She knows that economic stability that leaves the majority in grinding poverty is meaningless.
“Therefore, what she’s really saying — which the government has chosen to ignore — is that the economy is not growing, jobs are not being created, and too many people are suffering as a direct consequence of President Tinubu’s ill-conceived and badly implemented reforms. These are the issues she wanted the government to address.
“Like the international stateswoman that she is, Dr Okonjo-Iweala prefaced her comments with the niceties befitting her stature by commending the administration for ‘stabilising the economy’. But, having done with that courtesy, she immediately highlighted the urgent need for job creation to bring succour to the ever-growing army of unemployed youths and others who lost their jobs as businesses shut down under the crushing weight of the Tinubu-led government.
“She said the government needs to urgently grow the economy to put money in people’s pockets — which means that whatever ‘stable economy’ the government is celebrating has not translated into real relief for millions of Nigerian families, and they need to change course.
“For the record, the economy is not performing in a way that could justify such selective optimism. GDP growth in Q1 2025 was 3.13 percent, and Q2 registered barely over 3 percent — a sluggish pace that fails to meet the expectation of broad-based expansion.
“Forecasts for the year hover between 3.0 percent and 3.4 percent, far from the robust rebound the administration envisioned. Headline inflation remains unyielding, sitting at 22.22 percent as of June, with food inflation at 21.97 percent, meaning that millions of Nigerians are paying more, not less.
“Petrol prices now average ₦1,037.66 per litre, still a significant burden on households and small businesses. The naira trades at around ₦1,530 to the dollar — drastically weaker than President Tinubu’s pre-reform levels of ₦460 — eroding purchasing power across the board.
“In fact, it is the Tinubu administration’s policy choices — fuel subsidy removal, naira devaluation, tariff hikes on electricity and transport — that have triggered this distress and made social safety nets not optional but essential. Yet these programmes have either been administered haphazardly, suspended, or had negligible impact.
“Every well-meaning Nigerian knows that celebrating the mere appearance of ‘stability’ is not only pyrrhic but also dangerous. This is why we believe Dr Okonjo-Iweala tweeted a clarification this afternoon, noting that Nigerians are experiencing hardship from President Tinubu’s reforms, and that putting in place more programmes to help especially the poor and vulnerable manage this hardship is very important. She further stressed that ‘At the same time, it is necessary to start work on growing the economy to create more jobs and put money in people’s pockets.’
“It is in this regard that the ADC strongly believes such candour from a global economic leader like Dr Okonjo-Iweala underscores the urgent need for federal government policies that go beyond rhetoric and propaganda, but instead address the daily harsh realities of millions of Nigerians under the APC.”
Justice Muhammad Nuraddeen Bello of High Court sitting in Sokoto State has sentenced three men, including a foreign national, to death by hanging, after convicting them on charges bordering on terrorism and arms proliferation.
The convicts, Yusuf Muhammad (alias Sallau), a Nigerien; Jabbi Alhaji Yalle; and Kabiru Muhammad, were apprehended on 13th June, 2025, by the Department of State Services (DSS) Counter Terrorism Unit in connection with cross-border criminal activities bordering on arms trafficking and terrorism.
Bello, who found all three defendants guilty as charged and sentenced them to death by hanging, while also ordering the forfeiture of all monetary exhibits recovered from the convicts to the Federal Government, said: “The conviction is the latest in a series of successful prosecutions by the DSS in its sustained operations against terrorism and organised cross-border criminal networks across Nigeria.”
The sentencing is coming about two weeks after the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja sentenced each of the five suspects arrested on May 31, 2026, by the DSS for their involvement in the November 21, 2025, attack on St Mary’s Catholic School, Papiri, Niger State, to 25 years’ imprisonment.
Justice Binta Nyako, had handed down the judgment after the men, including two Nigeriens, pleaded guilty to all four terrorism-related charges, bordering on support for the commission of an act of terrorism, breaching both Section 16 of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022, and the Firearms Act, were pressed against them.
According to Count One, the men were accused of jointly conspiring to assist a terrorist by agreeing and intentionally playing various roles towards conveying 15 AK 103 rifles as well as about 1,434 rounds of 7.62mm live ammunition from the Diffa region, Republic of Niger, to one Malam Ahmad, a member of the Boko Haram terrorist group based in Borgu, Niger State, and thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 26(1) of the Terrorism (Prevention and Prohibition) Act, 2022.
Primate Elijah Ayodele, is on the verge of coughing out a whopping N10billion, if he fails to offer unrestrained apology to Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, former Governor of Kano State within the next 24 hours, and retract his claim that the former Minister of Defence is bidding his time to betray Peter Obi, to whom he is to contest the 2027 presidential election as a running mate.
Without doing so, the controversial cleric, should be ready for a major court battle with the vice-presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), the platform on which the pair is to contest the election.
In a letter indicating a legal action against Ayodele of the INRI Evangelical Spiritual Church over defamatory remarks, Kwankwaso, through Magaji Mato Ibrahim, SAN & Co., his lawyers demanded an immediate retraction and apology from the cleric over the allegations.
Details of the letter, dated June 11, and unveiled through the X platform of the legal team, was based on a viral video recorded during a live-streamed church service, where the preacher made allegations targeting Kwankwaso’s integrity as Peter Obi’s running mate under the NDC.
Quoting the cleric as stating: “KWANKWASO IS A FAKE TO OBI, KWANKWASO WILL BETRAY YOU. KWANKWASO HAS BEEN PAID TO BE VICE PRESIDENT TO OBI AMONG OTHER LIBELOUS COMMENTS WHILE PRETENDING TO BE A PREACHER,” the former governor said the comments were unprovoked, grossly unfounded, and carefully designed to create a rift within the ranks of the political party and its supporters.
Handing Ayodele a 24-hour ultimatum to publish a full and unequivocal retraction across all social media platforms and news outlets with the same prominence as the original video, they also demanded a written undertaking that he would cease and desist from making any further malicious statements against their client, warning that failure to comply, would lead to full legal actions.
The letter stated: “We shall claim substantial damages to the tune of Ten Billion Naira and cost of the action on a full indemnity basis amongst other reliefs.”
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Tuesday demanded the immediate end to the exportation of minerals from countries in Africa in their raw forms, which he said had led to massive exploitation of the continent.
The President, told member countries of the African Minerals Strategy Group (AMSG), a forum of Ministers in charge of Mining and Solid Minerals on the continent to speak with one voice to promote, collective interests, ensure value addition, and prevent the continent from becoming merely a source of raw materials for the rest of the world.
As the Grand Patron of the group, chaired by Dele Alake, Nigeria’s Minister of Solid Minerals Development, gave the charge while receiving a delegation of AMSG in the State House, Tinubu told the delegation that the group had a critical role to play in strengthening Africa’s bargaining power in the global mineral market and ensuring that the continent derives maximum value from its natural resources.
His words: “ What we should do is avoid bureaucracy and deceit; we must put an end to exploitation. The rest of the world won’t mind if your country is a cesspit of dams and rubbish and excavates your raw materials without giving value.
“It is our responsibility to collaborate and cooperate to ensure that these metals and minerals bring value to us, bring technology to us, and we can do it. It is how much each country will put into the research, development and refinery. I don’t see reasons we cannot demand centralisation of that conversation somewhere on the continent. So why not utilise that in our research and development and knowledge-based economy to enhance the quality of life and bring prosperity to our people.”
Emphasising that Africa possessed enormous mineral wealth that should be strategically harnessed to drive industrialisation, create jobs and accelerate economic transformation across the continent, the President, said the era of exporting raw minerals without local processing and beneficiation must give way to a new model that encourages investment in local industries, technology transfer and the development of value chains that retain wealth within Africa.
Alake, who had earlier expressed gratitude to the President for his exemplary leadership under the Renewed Hope Agenda, said the gesture had shown support for Nigeria’s mineral sector, especially in the local value-addition and economic diversification drive, where artisanal miners are empowered.
He told the President: “You encouraged us to look at the focal point of the establishment of this group, which is to ensure that the African natural resources, especially with regards to minerals, critical matters, are localised, the beneficiation coming directly to Africans generally.
“You charged us that we should set our sails very high and ensure that local value addition is a pivot around which all the objectives of this organisation should revolve.
“So, sir, we have gone implemented your charge and we are quitted that today local value addition is reverberating all over Africa.”
He added that some member countries have gone ahead to ban the export of raw minerals.
He explained members of the body were in Abuja for the Fifth edition of the African Natural Resources and Energy Investment Summit (AFNIS 2026), to push for a new continental approach to resource management and industrial development.
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