When the Numbers Keep Improving but the People Are Still Suffering

Each time I think about Nigeria’s worsening socioeconomic reality while listening to the Tinubu administration celebrating improved macroeconomic indicators, I am tempted to ask a simple but profound question: 

Who is deceiving whom?

The government may point to GDP growth, rising foreign reserves, increased government revenue, exchange-rate stability and other macroeconomic indicators as evidence that the economy is recovering. But the fundamental question is: recovering for whom?

Macroeconomic statistics may be reassuring to economists, international financial institutions and foreign investors. But what meaning do they have to the ordinary Nigerian whose income buys less every month, whose food bill keeps rising, whose rent is becoming unaffordable, whose children’s education costs more, whose healthcare is increasingly out of reach and whose sense of security is being eroded by the day?

An economy is not an abstract spreadsheet. It is ultimately about people.

What is the value of rising GDP if the average citizen cannot feel the growth in his or her pocket? 

What is the meaning of increased government revenue if it does not translate into better schools, hospitals, roads, electricity, security and a more dignified standard of living? 

What does a growing foreign reserve mean to a family struggling to put three decent meals on the table?

Statistics can tell us that an economy is improving. Only people's lived experiences can tell us whether their lives are improving.

This is where government must be careful not to keep  confusing economic indicators with economic wellbeing. 

Numbers can be massaged, interpreted and paraded; human suffering cannot be so easily disguised.

The real economic scorecard should therefore not be what government statistics say about Nigerians, but what Nigerians can honestly say about their own lives.

People should be asking themselves:

Am I financially better off today than I was when this government came to power?

Can my income buy more or less than it did before?

Has the wellbeing of my family improved?

Can I afford the things I could previously afford?

Are my children’s prospects brighter today?

Do I feel safer today than I did when this government started?

Has the quality of public services improved in ways I can actually see and feel?

These are not questions that can be answered by GDP figures, foreign reserves or government revenue charts.

At the end of the day, the true measure of an economy is not how impressive its statistics look on paper, but how dignified the lives of its people are in reality.

Government should therefore stop governing by statistics and start governing by outcomes.

Because an economy cannot be declared successful simply because the numbers are smiling while the people are crying.

The ultimate question is not whether the economy is growing. It is whether the Nigerian is living better.