Exactly three years after President Bola Ahmed Tinubu took the oath of office, the presidency is doubling down on the narrative that his economic medicine—however bitter—is the only cure for Nigeria’s ailing wallet. Sunday Dare, the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Public Communications, has released a retrospective piece titled 'One Thousand and Ninety-Five Days,' a sharp, unapologetic defence of the administration's performance during a period defined by skyrocketing food prices and the removal of the petrol subsidy.
Dare insists that the president knew exactly what he was doing when he triggered these shifts. He describes the president as a man who chose tough reforms over easy popularity. According to the aide, the nation was already suffocating under decades of bad habits and policy rot that everyone knew about but nobody dared to touch. By unifying the exchange rate and ending the subsidy, the government claims it is finally peeling back the layers of a system that only benefited a few powerful interests.
The easiest thing in governance is to drift with the tide. The hardest is to alter course in the middle of gathering turbulence. Sunday Dare notes that for those who have followed the President’s career, this isn't a new side of the man. He has worked closely with Bola Ahmed Tinubu for nearly 30 years, observing him rebuild political structures from the ground up. Dare paints a portrait of a leader who views governance like a technician tinkering with a machine—constantly redesigning institutions and managing coalitions that would leave lesser politicians drowning.
It is a calculated, almost cold, approach to running a country that demands heavy sacrifices from the common man.
The presidency's defence of the administration's economic medicine comes with a long list of policy changes designed to revamp the country's economic system. These reforms include the end to multi-trillion naira payments for the fuel subsidy, which long strained the national treasury; unifying the exchange rate to close the gap between official and parallel market currency rates and attract foreign investment; the deliberate re-engineering of government agencies to reduce fiscal leakages and structural waste; a long-term plan to shift the economy away from its total reliance on volatile oil revenues; and the act of pushing through unpopular mandates while maintaining a fragile governing coalition during high inflation.
Critics have often pointed to the rising cost of living as proof that the reforms are failing. However, the presidency's response is that sustainable prosperity is rarely a smooth walk. Sunday Dare argues that a country cannot keep subsidizing its own inefficiency forever. He frames the current economic hardship as a painful, necessary period of correction, warning that the alternative was a complete systemic collapse that would have been far worse for everyone involved.
The timing of this defence is significant, as the political temperature is starting to boil ahead of the 2027 general elections. Every policy shift carries a political price tag, and the administration is clearly preparing for the scrutiny that comes with seeking a mandate to continue its work. By casting Bola Ahmed Tinubu as a lonely reformist, Dare is setting the stage for a narrative where the President is the hero who did the heavy lifting while others looked the other way.
Whether this perspective holds up in the court of public opinion is a different matter. The average citizen struggling to balance their budget might see things differently than a presidential aide focused on long-term macroeconomics. Yet, the administration is betting that history will eventually validate these decisions. For now, the 'Reformer-in-Chief' tag is the official face of an administration trying to convince a weary public that the pain of today is the down payment for a stable tomorrow.