You Only Admitted Tinubu Made Nigeria Expensive – Atiku’s Aide Replies Reno Omokri

Phrank Shaibu, Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication to the African Democratic Congress presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, has criticised Nigeria’s Ambassador-designate to Mexico, Reno Omokri, over his claim that Nigerians can survive on N3,000 daily.

Shaibu argued that Omokri’s calculation amounted to an admission that the administration of President Bola Tinubu had made living in Nigeria increasingly expensive.

He made the remarks in a post on X on Monday while responding to Omokri’s comments on the rising cost of living and poverty benchmarks.

Omokri had, during an appearance on Sunday Politics, said his personal assessment of food prices showed that Nigerians could live on N3,000 a day.

He said he had visited markets with a journalist and checked the prices of essential commodities, including yam, rice, maize and fruits.

According to Omokri, the N3,000 daily figure should be understood within the Nigerian economic context, noting that the same amount would constitute poverty in the United States.

He said international poverty thresholds should take into account differences in the economic circumstances of individual countries.

Responding, Shaibu calculated that N3,000 daily would amount to N90,000 monthly, pointing out that the figure was already above the current N70,000 minimum wage.

“Let’s accept @renoomokri’s mathematics: ₦3,000 × 30 days = ₦90,000.

“The minimum wage is ₦70,000. So after working an entire month, a father must borrow ₦20,000 just to pay his transport, before buying a single cup of Garri for his children,” he wrote.

The Atiku aide then accused Omokri of inadvertently acknowledging the hardship Nigerians were facing under Tinubu.

“Thank you, Reno. You have just admitted the truth: @officialABAT made Nigeria expensive.

“@atiku will make Nigeria affordable again!” Shaibu added.

Omokri, meanwhile, defended the need to assess poverty within the realities of individual countries, saying the World Bank’s global benchmark should not be the only measure used to understand Nigerians’ living conditions.

“The World Bank is using a global benchmark. And they’ve always used it?” he said.

In a separate discussion on the programme, Omokri also rejected the perception that Nigeria was among the world’s most corrupt countries.

He argued that international corruption rankings often relied on global metrics that, in his view, failed to account for Nigeria’s cultural practices.

Omokri further cited Lagos’ economic growth and the annual Detty December festivities as examples of developments he said challenged negative perceptions about Nigeria.

He maintained that Nigerians should take greater responsibility for telling the country’s story rather than allowing foreign organisations to define its image.

“Nigeria is not as corrupt as the world thinks it is because the metrics they are using to gauge corruption are global metrics and they do not take into account the particular culture of Nigeria,” he said.

“When a public official does the job very well in this country, people show appreciation. Transparency International sees that as corruption, but it is not corruption,” he said.

“We have to write our own story. If we allow these people to continue writing our Stores, they will always see us as people who are poor and backward.”