Reviewed Letter to uncle bola tinubu

[Augustine Togonu-Bickersteth]

Uncle Bola Tinubu,

We have $200 billion corruptly stashed in Dubai, if we are to go by Senator Shehu Sani. Then we have $60 billion NNPC money corruptly stashed in Texas. Where is Lateef to go after the thief?

Uncle Bola Tinubu, research output is the hard currency of any country, so the $500 million you have just proposed for Research, Development, and Innovation is laughable. If you said $5 billion, then fine! Not $500 million. We would like you to do things in terms of a cost-benefit analysis. What you have done is given arbitrary figures and an abysmally small amount of money.

Uncle Bola Tinubu, we are not poor in Nigeria. We are credit-worthy, as a recent report from the chambers of Olisa Agbakoba has shown, and also a recent proclamation of the Nigerian Institute of Estate Surveyors and Valuers has shown, including PriceWaterhouseCoopers. The surveyors have a valuation of 500 trillion naira, and PwC of $800 billion dead capital.

Uncle Bola Tinubu, it is unacceptable for you or your government to unfold a plan of generating 3 million jobs a year! You seem not to appreciate the gravity of the situation on the ground.

Afolabi Abiodun, in the ThisDay of April 27, 2026, has this to say: "The jobs do not need to come from government. They need to come from an economy that government has stopped strangling. You have the tools. You have the mandates. You have the institutions. What 53 million young Nigerians need to know is whether you have the will."

Uncle Bola Tinubu, please read the full article in the BusinessDay. He is the Minister of Employment and Labour we do not have. If you cannot make him a minister, make him your Chief Adviser on Job Creation. A Nigerian who means well. Writing until someone listens. That is how he describes himself.

In the words of Prince Dapo Abiodun, visionary Governor of Ogun State, there is a nexus between criminality and unemployment. Governor Hope Uzodinma of Imo State also appreciates that with his Memorandum of Understanding with the University of California, Berkeley, to train 100,000 youths to digitise the state economy and move them away from wrongdoing. Like the former Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, has said, we have had enough of pilot projects; what we need to do is scale up.

Uncle Bola Tinubu, you came to office with a conservative 50 million Nigerians unemployed; now there are 53 million. There are two to three million entering the job market every year. If you do 3 million jobs a year, how long would it take you to mop up 53 million jobs? You have to do about 2 million jobs a month to mop up 53 million unemployed in record time.

I still think it is patently wrong to have a lawyer as Minister of Science, Tech, and Innovation, and a non-engineer or physicist as Minister of Power. In fact, what you need is perhaps a Minister of Energy. Like in the USA tradition, you have a Secretary of Energy. We have an energy crisis, for goodness' sake. We have the worst access to electricity worldwide. Are you aware of that, President Bola Tinubu, Omo Mama Oloja?

The story of the 20th century is the story of electricity. Nigeria 🇳🇬 is nowhere in the 20th century, let alone being in 2026!!

Like they say in chemical kinetics, the slowest step in a chemical reaction is the rate-determining step.

It is the number of people in darkness that determines our level of development, not the owners of plots of land worth 2 billion naira in Eko Atlantic City.

It is the 78 million Nigerians defecating in the open that determines our level of development, not some presidential jet of yours costing 150 billion naira, or the newly constructed multi-billion residence of the Vice President.

It is the 135 million in multi-dimensional poverty that determines our level of development.

It is the 170 million Nigerians exposed to killer water, contaminated drinking water, that determines our level of development. More Nigerians die of contaminated water than terrorism!

It is the 7 million babies 👶 born every year, 60 percent exposed to jaundice, with the result that they develop hearing impairment, visual impairment, brain damage 💔, and cerebral palsy because less than 5 percent of hospitals or maternity centers have incubators. It is a grave humanitarian disaster.

It is the 20 million plus out-of-school children that determines our level of development.

It is the 41 million SMEs, where only 5 percent have access to credit facilities, that determines our level of development.

Thank you for reading, Uncle Bola Tinubu.

Signed:

Augustine Togonu-Bickersteth, London, England 🇬🇧 May 7, 2026

[John Onyeukwu]

Chief Augustine,

Your letter to "Uncle Bola Tinubu" reads less like a policy memo and more like the voice of a concerned elder speaking from a place of patriotism and urgency. Whether one agrees with every figure you cited or not, the sentiment behind the letter is difficult to dismiss.

As I read through it, I found myself returning to a simple question: What truly determines whether a nation is progressing?

I think that is the central issue you have raised.

You argue, quite forcefully, that development is not measured by the value of assets in exclusive districts, the size of government convoys, or the number of announcements made from podiums. Rather, it is measured by whether ordinary citizens can switch on a light, drink clean water, find meaningful work, educate their children, access healthcare, and participate productively in the economy.

That is a proposition with which few reasonable people would disagree.

However, I would respectfully suggest that Nigeria's challenge is not only about the volume of resources available to government; it is equally about the effectiveness with which those resources are deployed. Our history shows that periods of abundance have not always translated into broad-based prosperity. The missing ingredient has often been institutional discipline, policy consistency, accountability, and execution.

Your observations on electricity deserve particular attention. Every industrial success story—from South Korea to China, from Singapore to Vietnam—was built on reliable energy. Factories run on electricity. Hospitals run on electricity. Schools, technology hubs, water systems, and small businesses run on electricity. In many respects, power is not merely another sector; it is the platform upon which every other sector depends.

I also share your concern about employment, though perhaps from a slightly different angle. The solution is not for government to become the nation's largest employer. No economy has achieved sustained prosperity that way. The real challenge is creating an environment where entrepreneurs, manufacturers, farmers, innovators, and investors can create jobs at scale. The most effective employment policy is often a productive economy.

Your point on research and innovation is equally significant. Nations that dominate today's global economy made long-term investments in science, technology, research, and human capital. The question before Nigeria is not whether we should invest in innovation, but whether we are investing at a level consistent with our ambitions to become a leading economy.

Yet, Chief, what struck me most was not your comments on budgets, jobs, or even electricity. It was your insistence that we judge progress from the perspective of the ordinary Nigerian.

The true test of government policy is not found in official reports or economic projections, but in the lived realities of ordinary Nigerians: the market woman struggling with rising costs, the graduate searching endlessly for meaningful work, the small business owner spending a fortune on generators to stay afloat, the farmer unable to cultivate in peace because of insecurity, and the family deprived of clean water or quality healthcare. These are the citizens whose daily experiences ultimately validate or invalidate public policy and determine whether governance is delivering on its promise.

The Constitution tells us that the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government. That provision is not merely legal language; it is the standard against which every administration must be assessed.

So, Chief, while others may debate the numbers in your letter, I think the larger challenge you pose to Uncle Bola Tinubu, and indeed to all of us, is this: Are we focusing on the things that genuinely improve the lives of Nigerians?

That is a conversation worth having.

And perhaps, until more people listen, it is a conversation worth repeating.

Warm regards,

John 

John Onyeukwu
http://www.policy.hu/onyeukwu/

 http://about.me/onyeukwu
“Let us move forward to fight poverty, to establish equity, and assure peace for the next generation.”
-- James D. Wolfensohn
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