By Kunle Oshobi

There is a comedy playing out in the corridors of power, but unfortunately, the audience is paying with empty stomachs. The headline act of the Tinubu administration’s economic strategy seems to be a classic game of political hot-potato: crash the vehicle of macroeconomic stability, leap out of the driver’s seat, and point wildly at the state governors and local government chairmen riding in the backseat.

The administration’s sudden enthusiasm for grassroots accountability would be admirable if it were not so transparently convenient. The official line urged upon long-suffering citizens is simple: “Your state and local governments are getting massive federal allocations now. Go and hold them responsible for your hunger!”
It is a masterclass in deflection, but the mathematics and the constitution tell a radically different story.

The Illusion of “Increased Allocations”
Yes, the nominal figures disbursed by the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) to subnationals have surged. But celebrating an increase in paper naira while ignoring its decimated purchasing power is economic theatre.
When a federal government unleashes a twin-engine shockwave—the unhedged floating of the naira and the abrupt removal of fuel subsidies—it prints trillions of inflated naira notes.

Sending extra buckets of devalued currency to a state governor while the cost of basic food, transportation, and materials has quadrupled is not financial empowerment; it is returning a fraction of a house’s value after burning down the neighborhood.
Crucially, the Federal Government still retains the lion’s share of the FAAC allocation, comfortably scooping the largest chunk of the national revenue pie before dropping the remaining slices down the federal ladder.

Who Controls the Lever?
To suggest that state and local government officials hold the remote control to inflation or commodity pricing is to rewrite basic economics:

• Monetary Policy: State governors do not set the Monetary Policy Rate, manage the Central Bank’s foreign exchange reserves, or dictate national money supply.
• Fiscal Policy & Customs: Local government chairmen do not set import tariffs, clear goods at the ports, or determine the pump price of refined fuel.
• Macroeconomic Conditions: The structural drivers of headline inflation—from fuel costs to currency volatility—are federal policy decisions conceived and executed entirely out of Abuja.

Expecting a local government chairman to tame runaway inflation using a slightly higher nominal allocation is like asking a bucket brigade to put out a forest fire while the central fire station keeps pouring gasoline from above.

Taking the Wheel or Shifting the Blame?

True leadership is measured not by how deftly an administration can pass the buck when ill-digested reforms bite, but by taking ownership of the policy climate it created.

Subnational governments must absolutely be held accountable for transparent spending within their jurisdictions. However, weaponizing increased nominal allocations as a shield against federal economic missteps is a strategy as hollow as the buckets everyday citizens carry to empty taps.

If the central administration wants the praise for sweeping “reforms,” it must also own the immediate wreckage those reforms cause, rather than pretending the steering wheel was at the local council office all along.

Kunle Oshobi is The Head of Planning and Strategy and Chairman Narrative Command of The Narrative Force