Tinubunomics In Motion: When Macroeconomic Reforms Begin To Touch The Market Stall And Awakens The Sleeping Giant

BY BUNMI AWOYEMI

There is a saying among market women in Balogun, Iddo, Oyingbo and Mike 12 Markets that, “policy wey no reach pot, no be policy.” In the grand theatre of governance, economic policy only finds meaning when its abstractions descend from the corridors of power into the kitchens of ordinary citizens.

Yesterday, I walked into one of the outlets of Bokku Mart, a fast growing boutique supermarket chain in Lagos, Nigeria — not as an analyst or commentator, but as a consumer in search of sustenance.

I wanted to buy a 50kg bag of Big Bull rice, priced at ₦59,000, but the shelves were bare. Other shoppers had mopped up the stock. Left with no choice, I settled for two 25kg bags at ₦31,000 each, and could not resist a mild protest: “Two 25kg bags make 50kg,” I told the attendant. “Why not ₦29,500 each instead of ₦31,000?”

Yet beneath that moment of domestic irritation lay a deeper realization — the unmistakable pulse of change. A year ago, a 50kg bag of rice sold for a staggering ₦110,000 in most markets across Nigeria. The 10kg bag of Mama Rice I bought for ₦13,500 yesterday would have cost ₦17,000 or more just months ago.

Last week, a paint bucket of fresh tomatoes that once sold for ₦17,000 during the inflationary inferno of 2023/2024 now sells for ₦5,000, while a bucket of Tatase (red bell pepper) that previously commanded ₦20,000 has dropped to ₦6,000.

These are not random fluctuations in a chaotic market — they are the first green shoots of Tinubunomics in bloom: the translation of macroeconomic reform into microeconomic relief.

For over a year, critics dismissed the administration’s reforms as elite economics — numbers on paper that never trickled down. But those numbers are beginning to speak in Yoruba, Igbo, and Hausa — the native dialects of affordability, stability, and restored confidence.

From Balogun to Oyingbo, from Iddo to Mile 12, traders and shoppers now whisper that the market is breathing again.

The exchange rate may not yet have reached its final equilibrium, but the visible softening of food prices hints at a reversal of Nigeria’s inflationary trajectory.

Indeed, the data corroborate the experience on the streets.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Nigeria’s headline inflation rate eased to 18.02% in September of 2025, compared to 20.12% in August 2025 and 39% in the 1st quarter of 2024. This 18.02% is the sixth consecutive month of deceleration and the first time in three years that inflation has fallen below the 20% threshold. This milestone, buried beneath the noise of political bickering, signals the quiet success of a policy direction rooted in fiscal realism.

Nigeria’s GDP growth rate for Q2 2025 stood at 4.23%, representing a rise from 3.48% in the same quarter of 2024. This acceleration was driven largely by robust expansion in the industrial sector, buoyed by increased oil production, steady refinery output, and reviving manufacturing indices — complemented by moderate but consistent gains in agriculture and services.

On the fiscal front, even the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has acknowledged Nigeria’s growing discipline.

According to its latest Fiscal Monitor Report, released during the World Bank–IMF Annual Meetings in Washington D.C., Nigeria’s general government gross debt (debt-to-GDP) is projected to decline steadily over the next two years — from 39.3% in 2024 to 36.4% in 2025, and further to 35% in 2026.

This projection, which includes Central Bank overdrafts and AMCON liabilities, underscores a return to fiscal sobriety and economic stability — the hallmarks of an administration determined to live within its means.

Even more compelling is the transformation in Nigeria’s external trade position. Speaking at the G24 press briefing on the sidelines of the IMF/World Bank Annual Meetings in Washington D.C., Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Olayemi Cardoso, revealed that Nigeria’s trade surplus has risen to six per cent of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product, attributing the improvement to the ongoing macroeconomic reforms championed by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

According to Cardoso, who represented the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun, the surplus is expected to remain stable in the near term as reforms continue to take hold.

The statement, signed by Mohammed Manga, Director of Information at the Federal Ministry of Finance, emphasized that “Nigeria’s economic outlook is brightening despite global headwinds.”

Corroborating this, the National Bureau of Statistics reported that Nigeria’s trade surplus widened by 44.3% in Q2 2025, rising to ₦7.46 trillion, up from ₦5.17 trillion in the previous quarter — a reflection of buoyant export earnings outpacing import pressures.

This is the language of macroeconomic victory translated into household experience. What economists describe as a 6% trade surplus-to-GDP ratio is what the ordinary trader at these various markets feel when a bag of rice drops from ₦110,000 to ₦59,000, or when tomatoes and peppers regain sanity in price.

The Nigerian economy is not merely recovering; it is restructuring, rebalancing, and reasserting its sovereignty. What began as painful fiscal surgery in 2023 has now evolved into a broad-based healing process.

Tinubunomics is not magic; it is method — an audacious blend of monetary discipline, fiscal consolidation, and industrial revitalization. The numbers now have a human face.

And as the Federal Executive Council finalizes the 2026–2027 Medium-Term Fiscal Framework and the National Productivity and Competitiveness Strategy, the stage is being set for the next leap — a Nigeria where macroeconomic discipline births microeconomic dignity.

If this trajectory continues, historians may one day write that it was under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu that Nigeria learned to align its books, tame its inflation, and restore the dignity of its currency — not through decree, but through discipline.

In the language of the market men and women of Lagos: “This policy don reach pot.”

Global Validation

The world is beginning to take notice. In recent months, Fitch Ratings revised Nigeria’s sovereign outlook from stable to positive, citing improved fiscal transparency and sustained reforms in the FX and energy sectors.

Moody’s Investors Service upgraded Nigeria’s credit outlook on account of declining inflation, stabilizing reserves, and a stronger external balance sheet.

Even Standard & Poor’s noted that “Nigeria’s fiscal reforms are beginning to yield durable macroeconomic dividends.”

Foreign direct investment flows, which had stagnated during the uncertainty of 2022–2023, are rebounding — with commitments pouring in from the US, Qatar, China, Taiwan, Saudi Arabia, Britain, Sweden, Italy, Germany, Brasil, Singapore, Morocco, India, France, and the UAE, targeting Renewable Energy, Thermal Energy, Hydro Energy, Water Transportation, Agriculture, Agro-processing, AI Data Centres, AI Academies, petrochemical value chains, Natural and Compressed Natural Gas Transmission and Distribution infrastructure, and humanitarian/social interventions like Technical and Vocational Education Centres for out of school children to make them productive.

For the first time in years, the narrative of “Africa’s sleeping giant” is being rewritten — not by Western journalists, but by the markets themselves.

If this momentum holds, Nigeria will not just be a participant in the global economy; it will be a price-setter, a trend-driver, and a continental anchor.

The age of Tinubunomics has only just begun and it has awakened the Sleeping giant, Nigeria. .

Dr. Bunmi Awoyemi is a Real Estate Developer and Builder