The presidential candidate of the Labour Party in the 2023 election, Mr. Peter Obi, has raised the alarm over what he described as Nigeria’s descent into a “relentless crime scene,” following revelations of a massive ₦7 trillion budget fraud uncovered in the 2025 national budget.
Reacting to a report by civic tech organisation BudgIT, which flagged thousands of dubious projects worth trillions of naira, Obi said the discovery underscores the entrenched corruption crippling the country’s development.
In a statement shared on his official X handle on Wednesday, Obi said: “I have consistently maintained that for this country to make progress, Nigeria must cease to function as a crime scene and be repositioned for genuine development. This entrenched corruption—persistent and deeply rooted—must be nipped in the bud if there is to be any meaningful turnaround.”
Obi expressed outrage that the ₦7 trillion in questionable budgetary allocations surpassed the total budgets of four key ministries vital to national growth.
According to him, the Ministry of Education received ₦3.52 trillion, the Ministry of Health ₦2.48 trillion, the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation ₦260 billion, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security ₦636.08 billion, together totalling ₦6.896 trillion.
“That ₦7 trillion figure is even more than the ₦6.1 trillion allocated to national security—at a time when Nigeria is one of the most terrorised countries in the world,” Obi noted.
He warned that corruption has directly undermined the government’s capacity to fund essential services like education and healthcare, tackle hunger, and support small businesses.
He said, “We are facing an education crisis with nearly 20 million children out of school. Malnutrition is rampant due to failing primary healthcare systems. The agriculture sector is neglected. Our security architecture is underfunded. All of these are symptoms of a nation crippled by mismanagement and fiscal recklessness.”
Obi called for urgent reforms and accountability, insisting that the nation’s resources must be managed with transparency and invested in sectors that directly improve the lives of Nigerians.
“These glaring acts of corruption reinforce my position: Nigeria has been reduced to a crime scene. We must confront this with unwavering resolve. A new Nigeria is possible,” he declared.
The BudgIT report, which sparked Obi’s reaction, detailed how thousands of suspicious and inflated projects were inserted into the 2025 budget, raising concerns about growing impunity among political elites.
