Nigeria’s election campaign begins with Tinubu facing a reform test

Oyedele’s struggle captures the political dilemma facing President Bola Tinubu as Nigeria moves towards the 2027 presidential election: whether voters will judge his reforms by their long-term promises or by the immediate economic pain they have endured.

Tinubu removed the fuel subsidy shortly after taking office in 2023 and introduced foreign-exchange reforms that allowed the naira to trade more freely, arguing that the measures were necessary to strengthen public finances, attract investment, and stabilise Africa’s largest economy.

The reforms won support from investors and economists who had long argued that Nigeria needed to address deep structural problems in its economy. But the benefits of such reforms are typically slower to reach households than the costs they create.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said Nigeria’s reforms had improved macroeconomic stability, but warned that living conditions remained difficult for many citizens. For many households, the immediate impact has been higher food prices, rising transport costs and declining purchasing power.

The government has to convince Nigerians that those gains will eventually translate into better lives, and give them a credible reason to wait for that to happen,

Sekinat Ojeniyi, a senior analyst at global risk advisory firm Africa Practice, told Al Jazeera.

That is a much harder political proposition when people have already made significant sacrifices.

For Tinubu, the political test is not only defending his reforms. It is persuading voters to endure their costs before they feel their benefits.

Nigeria’s Tinubu enters race amid public anger over economic hardship and insecurity

I think there is a danger of viewing the 2027 election purely as a referendum on Tinubu,

she said.

It is also a referendum on the quality of Nigeria’s political opposition and, more broadly, on whether our democracy is producing meaningful choices for citizens.