The fourth year of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration is winding up. It’s now clear to anyone following that Nigeria’s accumulating Foreign Reserves during his tenure has been penned down as proof of prudent economic management (i.e. savings), to be repeated tirelessly by campaign team during his 2019 re-election bid. Like technically defeating Boko Haram, this too is false. But increasingly worrying, media observers are regurgitating the Foreign Reserves claim as ‘fact’ without scrutiny. Like Channels TV’s Ajuri Ngelale, here . For clarity sakes, ‘Foreign Reserves’ is the wrong measure of national savings. Controversial Excess Crude Account and improved version, Sovereign Wealth Fund , are. Also, the much touted Foreign Reserves increase from $28.6 billion when Buhari took office in May 2015, to $47.6 billion as at May 2018, has been artificial. Thus, not by corresponding increase in national exports (which halved over the period, compared to 2013 export value
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