Why the Obasanjo/Atiku Years Remain the Golden Age of Economic Liberalisation and Why 2027 Requires a Man Prepared for the Job

There are elections in which a nation chooses a personality. There are elections in which it chooses a political party. And there are moments when a country must choose competence.
For Nigeria in 2027, the central question should therefore not merely be who wants the presidency? It should be: who has demonstrated that he understands how to rebuild a broken economy, attract investment, empower the private sector and make government work?

That question inevitably brings the record of the Obasanjo/Atiku administration of 1999–2007 back into national conversation.
The administration inherited an economy burdened by inefficient state enterprises, weak institutions, infrastructure deficits and an overbearing public sector. Its response was one of the most ambitious programmes of economic liberalisation in Nigeria’s Fourth Republic.

The Bureau of Public Enterprises describes the programme as beginning in 1999 and encompassing commercialisation, privatisation and liberalisation across numerous sectors.
Atiku Abubakar, as Vice-President and Chairman of the National Council on Privatisation, was at the centre of that transformation. And what did it achieve?

1. It changed the philosophy of government.
   The Obasanjo/Atiku administration challenged the assumption that government must own and operate virtually every commercial enterprise. The new philosophy was straightforward: government should regulate, create the rules and provide public goods; entrepreneurs should drive productive enterprise.
2. It attacked the culture of state ownership.
   Nigeria had hundreds of public enterprises consuming scarce public resources while delivering inadequate returns. The reform programme sought to transfer commercially viable activities to more efficient private operators. The IMF at the time identified deregulation and privatisation as central components of the government’s structural reform programme.
3. It put telecommunications on the path to revolution.
   Perhaps no reform better demonstrates the power of liberalisation than telecommunications. The opening of the sector to private operators and the emergence of GSM transformed communications from a privilege enjoyed by a tiny minority into a mass-market service. Academic research describes telecommunications liberalisation as one of the major growth drivers of Nigeria’s first decade of democratic rule.
4. It broke the monopoly mentality.
   The reform programme deliberately sought competition rather than perpetual government monopoly. That principle became the foundation upon which Nigeria’s telecommunications, financial, banking, ports and other sectors expanded.
5. It introduced private capital into strategic sectors.
   Privatisation was not conceived simply as selling government assets. The official programme sought strategic investors with financial resources and technical and managerial competence capable of unlocking the value trapped inside inefficient enterprises.
6. It redefined the role of government in the economy.
   The objective was to move government away from running businesses and towards creating an enabling environment in which businesses could flourish. That remains one of the fundamental requirements for sustainable economic growth today.
7. It advanced power-sector reform.
   The administration laid important foundations for restructuring the electricity industry, including the Electric Power Sector Reform Act of 2005 and the eventual unbundling of the electricity monopoly. The reform framework created the basis for competition and private participation.
8. It pursued port concessioning for efficiency and ease of doing business.
   The concessioning of major ports was part of the broader effort to improve efficiency, reduce the government’s direct operational burden and introduce private-sector management into infrastructure. This has introduced better efficiency in operations and enhanced the ease of doing business.
9. It liberalised trade.
   Tariff reforms and reductions in trade restrictions were pursued to expose Nigerian businesses to greater competition and reduce distortions that encouraged smuggling and rent-seeking.
10. It strengthened the financial sector.
    Bank consolidation reduced the number of banks from 89 to 25 while recapitalising the surviving institutions. The reform created stronger financial institutions capable of supporting a modern economy. Today, Nigerian banking brands are better capitalised, stronger and establishing continental and global footprints in financial capitals of the world.
11. It strengthened economic institutions.
    The period produced or strengthened institutions and frameworks that remain important to Nigeria’s economic architecture, including the Debt Management Office, pension reform structures, sector regulators and other specialised institutions.
12. It promoted pension reform.
    The transformation of Nigeria’s pension architecture moved the country away from an unsustainable defined public-sector pension model towards a contributory system designed to mobilise long-term domestic savings.
13. It encouraged investment.
    The reform environment increased the attractiveness of Nigeria to domestic and international investors. The objective was to replace government-controlled economic activity with a more competitive investment environment.
14. It reduced the fiscal burden of inefficient enterprises.
    The official rationale for privatisation included improving public-sector financial health by reducing the burden of subsidising poorly performing enterprises and freeing resources for sectors such as education, healthcare and infrastructure.
15. It embraced competition as an engine of growth.
    The central lesson of the reform era was that competition can unlock productivity, innovation and investment where monopoly and bureaucratic control have failed.
16. It demonstrated that reform requires political courage.
    Privatisation inevitably creates powerful opponents because it disrupts entrenched interests. The Obasanjo/Atiku administration nevertheless pursued reforms across sectors in the face of resistance. By the end of 2006, most of the enterprises initially scheduled for privatisation had been dealt with, although several major transactions remained incomplete and the programme experienced some delays and attracted some unintended consequences.
17. It demonstrated the value of policy continuity.
    Economic transformation does not happen through slogans. It requires institutions, legislation, regulation, transaction expertise and sustained implementation. That was the real significance of the period.
18. It produced an economic model that remains relevant.
    Nigeria’s challenge today is not fundamentally different: government must create the conditions for businesses to invest, produce, employ and compete. The difference is that today’s problems are larger, and the cost of policy failure is greater.
19. It gives Atiku a uniquely relevant résumé.
    Atiku was not merely a politician observing economic policy from the sidelines. As Vice-President and Chairman of the National Council on Privatisation, he was positioned at the centre of the reform machinery. The IMF’s contemporary documentation specifically notes that the Vice-President chaired the National Council on Privatisation and its sectoral steering committees.
    That experience matters.
    Nigeria does not need another president who will spend the first two years discovering how government works.
    It needs someone who has done the work before.
20. That is why 2027 should be about preparedness, not prestige.
    The presidency is not a trophy. It is not an ornament. It is not a reward for political ambition.
    It is a job.
    And Nigeria’s economic crisis requires a president who understands the machinery of economic recovery: investment mobilisation, private-sector development, institutional reform, infrastructure financing, fiscal discipline, deregulation, competition, job creation and productivity.

This is where Atiku Abubakar’s record becomes particularly significant.

The argument for Atiku is not simply that he wants to become president. Many people want the presidency.
The stronger argument is that he has previously participated in a government that attempted to change the architecture of the Nigerian economy, and that his vantage experience at the National Level gives him unusually direct exposure to the mechanics of economic liberalisation.

The Obasanjo/Atiku era was not perfect. Its privatisation programme may have had a few controversies, incomplete transactions and shortcomings in some areas that deserve honest acknowledgement. But judged against the economic philosophy of the Fourth Republic, it represented one of Nigeria’s most consequential attempts to move from a state-dominated economy towards a private-sector-led growth model.

That is why its greatest legacy may not be any individual transaction.
Its greatest legacy was an idea:
Government does not have to own everything to make Nigeria prosperous. Government must create the conditions in which Nigerians can build everything.

In 2027, Nigeria will need more than another occupant of Aso Rock.
It will need an economic reformer.
It will need somebody who understands that wealth is created by productive enterprise, not government consumption; that investment follows confidence; that jobs follow investment; that competition drives efficiency; and that government must become an enabler rather than an obstacle to enterprise.

Others may covet the office because of its prestige.
Atiku Abubakar comes with a record that suggests he understands the job.
And when a country is facing an economic emergency, preparedness should matter more than prestige.
That is the strongest economic argument for Atiku Abubakar in 2027.

ISSUED BY THE NARRATIVE FORCE.