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The Independent Media and Policy Initiative has challenged opposition presidential candidates to present Nigerians with alternative economic blueprints capable of growing the economy to $1trillion within four years.

The think-tank said presenting such plan ahead of the 2027 presidential election would be a better campaign strategy for opposition parties than engaging in mudslinging, personal attacks and criticism of the government.

In a policy brief by its Chairman, Omoniyi Akinsiju, IMPI advised the presidential candidates to focus on economic policies that could be subjected to measurable and verifiable tests rather than what it described as populist rhetoric.

The organisation said the candidates should make a $1trillion economy a central commitment in their manifestos.

It said, ‘We challenge the larger political class, especially presidential candidates, to headline their manifestos with a commitment to growing Nigeria’s economy to $1 trillion over the next four years.

‘This is the only logical path forward for Nigeria. It ensures that any candidate who wins the 2027 presidential election will move the country past the era of managing scarcity and distributing handouts.’

According to the IMPI, achieving a $1trillion economy would expand national production and help transform Nigeria’s growing population from an economic burden into a major productive asset.

The group said meeting the target would, however, require clearly defined sectoral milestones rather than wishful thinking.

‘To demonstrate true readiness for national leadership, alternative presidential candidates must anchor their economic agendas to a single, measurable, and uncompromised destination: propelling Nigeria into a $1 trillion economy by 2031,’ it said.

The IMPI argued that any manifesto that failed to provide a pathway to the target would amount to an intention to manage poverty rather than create sustainable wealth.

The think- tank said the administration of President Bola Tinubu had already set a target of achieving a $1trillion economy and challenged opposition candidates to explain how they would achieve a better outcome.

‘Having officially anchored the administration’s current medium-term target around a highly realistic $1 trillion economy by 2030, the federal administration has shown clarity, execution capacity, and the momentum to scale national wealth.

‘Therefore, the burden of proof now shifts entirely to the opposition,’ the IMPI said.

It also challenged the candidates to identify the productive sectors they would reform and explain how they would do so without dismantling what it described as critical foundations, including unified foreign exchange windows and improved fiscal discipline.

IMPI also enjoined Nigerians to reject presidential candidates who fail to provide a clear pathway towards building a larger economy within four years of assuming office.

‘Any alternative candidate who refuses to commit to a $1 trillion manifesto headline admits a lack of vision to lead a modern Nigeria, and an intention to govern through fiscal rationing and poverty distribution rather than systemic wealth generation,’ it said.

‘Nigeria cannot afford another election cycle dominated by tribal sentiments, personal grievances, or vague manifestos. If the opposition truly represents a better alternative for the Nigerian people, they must step up, show their calculations, and give us a granular roadmap to a $1 trillion economy,’ the IMPI said.

The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and its Benin Republic counterpart have commenced work on a digital interconnection system to facilitate faster clearance of goods, improve risk management and strengthen coordination at the Sèmè-Kraké Joint Border Post.

The initiative is aimed at establishing real-time exchange of customs declarations, manifests, transit information, risk profiles and enforcement alerts between the two countries.

Comptroller-General of Customs, Bashir Adewale Adeniyi, disclosed this at the assessment and commissioning of the Joint Border Post at Sèmè-Kraké on the Nigeria-Benin border.

Adeniyi said the proposed interconnection would address the major gap preventing the facility from operating as a truly joint border post.

He said although Nigeria and Benin had shared the facility for years, the two Customs administrations were still operating separate systems.

According to him, the buildings and infrastructure at the border were completed, but what remained was the integration of the systems used by both administrations.

He said, ‘Without interconnectivity, this is not a joint border post. It is two border posts sharing a car park.’

Adeniyi said work was already underway to connect the two Customs administrations through a common data exchange arrangement, building on their experience with regional transit systems.

He explained that the system would enable a declaration lodged on one side of the border to become visible to the other side in real time.

It would also allow transit consignments to be tracked from their point of origin to destination, while risk profiles and enforcement alerts generated by one administration could be transmitted to its counterpart before they became outdated.

The Customs boss said the reform was necessary because Sèmè-Kraké sits on the Abidjan-Lagos Corridor, which carries about 70 per cent of the sub-region’s transit trade.

He described the crossing as one of the busiest land borders in West Africa, operating round the clock throughout the year.

Adeniyi said delays at the border had consequences beyond the immediate crossing point, as every hour lost affected consignments, travellers and the prices of goods in markets from Cotonou to Lagos.

He said the two Customs administrations had also identified other measures required to make the border more efficient, including the restoration of scanning facilities, improved access control, surveillance and lighting.

He added that there was a need for a standing Nigeria-Benin enforcement and intelligence mechanism for coordinated patrols and rapid response.

The NCS chief also called for harmonised bilingual standard operating procedures covering cargo, passengers, inspection, and transit and incident escalation.

He said joint risk management would enable the Customs administrations to focus resources on high-risk consignments rather than subjecting all cargo to the same level of intervention.

Adeniyi further called for an empowered joint management structure for the shared infrastructure, a preventive maintenance framework and better organisation of the border yard through dedicated lanes, holding areas, signage and a regulated market space.

He said the objective was to transform Sèmè-Kraké into a technology-enabled Joint Border Post based on Customs interconnectivity, joint risk management, coordinated enforcement, secure infrastructure, harmonised procedures and accountable joint governance.

The Comptroller-General said the experience could provide a model for other border crossings within the region.

He noted that the move was in line with commitments made by the governments of Nigeria and Benin to deepen bilateral trade and integration.

The Director-General of Benin Customs, Colonel Raouf Malèhossou, said the two administrations must move beyond sharing experiences to implementing coordinated border management techniques.

Malèhossou said the objective was to determine whether a truck, trader or traveller could be processed only once and whether the two countries’ data and risk-management systems could communicate before the movement reached the border.

He stressed the importance of risk management in facilitating legitimate trade while protecting the border against illicit activities.

According to him, modern roads, scanners and other infrastructure alone cannot guarantee an efficient border.

He said institutional coordination, digital interoperability, clear lines of responsibility and continuous investment in customs personnel were equally important.

Malèhossou said the reforms would help Nigeria and Benin take advantage of the opportunities presented by intra-African trade, particularly under the African Continental Free Trade Area.

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Monday declared that the era of white elephant projects was over, warning the Regional Development Commissions against becoming conduits for wasting public funds through projects that do not directly improve Nigerians’ lives.

The President also warned the boards and managements of the commissions against corruption, marginalisation, politicisation and ethnicisation of their operations, saying his administration would not hesitate to sanction anyone found culpable.

Tinubu spoke in Abuja while declaring open the first North Central Stakeholders Development Summit organised by the North Central Development Commission (NCDC).

Represented by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Senator George Akume, the President charged the commissions to develop clear, concise, attainable and fundable programmes capable of unlocking the economic potential of their respective regions.

‘The era of white elephant projects is over and there is no excuse for the Commissions to become another conduit for wasting public funds.

‘Such actions will not be tolerated and government will not hesitate to sanction anyone found culpable’, Tinubu said.

Tinubu, however, assured the commissions of the Federal Government’s political and financial backing, directing the SGF to ensure that all funds accruing to them were released as and when due.

‘Government will continue to give the NCDC and other Regional Development Commissions the political and financial backing to embark on key projects that will unlock the economic and industrial potentials of the nation.

‘I therefore direct the Secretary to the Government of the Federation to ensure that all funds accruable to the Commissions are released as and when due,’ he said.

The President also urged the commissions not to rely exclusively on government funding, advising them to explore alternative sources of financing, including public-private partnerships, donor funding and development financing, subject to their establishing laws and government guidelines.

Tinubu said establishing the Regional Development Commissions was part of his administration’s Renewed Hope Agenda to accelerate development and address longstanding development gaps across the country.

He clarified that the commissions were not established to replace, duplicate or usurp the functions of any tier of government.

‘Rather, it is our way of looking at why development gaps still exist and trying to close them up for the benefit of our people,’ he said.

According to him, the commissions must focus on development priorities that unlock the potential of their respective regions while strengthening interconnectivity across the country.

He identified roads, rail and air transportation, industrialisation, security, investment, human capital development, education and health as critical sectors requiring attention.

Tinubu also charged the Ministry of Regional Development to ensure that the commissions operated within the Regional Development Policy Document, while urging the legislature to provide the necessary oversight.

Speaking specifically on the North Central, the President said the region possessed enormous potential in agriculture, food production and agro-processing, solid minerals development and processing, industrial development, peace and security.

He, however, said the region had operated below its potential for too long, challenging stakeholders to use the summit to chart a new development trajectory capable of transforming its economic fortunes.

The President acknowledged the security challenges confronting parts of the region, saying the Federal Government had intensified surveillance and intelligence gathering, established more security formations, deployed additional personnel and increased the prosecution of criminals.

He said the government had also supported dialogue and reconciliation as part of efforts to restore peace and stability.

Tinubu urged the NCDC to complement the Federal Government’s efforts to stabilise the region, stressing that meaningful development could only take place in an atmosphere of peace and security.

He described the summit’s theme, ‘The Great Leap Forward: A 20-Year Economic, Infrastructural and Social Development Plan for the North Central Region,’ as appropriate, saying it provided stakeholders an opportunity to develop a consensus-driven roadmap for the region.

The President urged participants to scrutinise the proposed development plan and ensure that it reflected the aspirations of the people while aligning with the Renewed Hope Agenda.

He warned the NCDC against letting the summit’s outcome suffer the fate of previous development initiatives whose recommendations were never implemented.

‘This Summit should not end up as one of those platforms where ideas are ventilated and reports generated only to be left dusting on the shelves. The NCDC should show a better example by following through to implementation,’ Tinubu said.

He urged the commission to translate the summit’s outcome into concrete, measurable projects that would stimulate economic activity, improve livelihoods, and unlock the North Central region’s vast potential.

Denge Onoh, former Southeast spokesman for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Chairman of the Forum of Former Members of the Enugu State House of Assembly, has questioned the claim by socio-political commentator and ambassador-designate to Mexico, Reno Omokri that an average Nigerian can comfortably live on ?3,000 daily.

In a statement made available to journalists in Abuja, Onoh said the calculation, which amounts to about ?90,000 monthly, did not adequately reflect the cost of living and the economic realities facing Nigerian households.

He noted that although ?90,000 is above the current ?70,000 national minimum wage, using a daily figure of ?3,000 as a measure of affordability fails to account for household size, food inflation and other essential expenses.

Onoh said the analysis appeared to treat the Nigerian as an individual economic unit, whereas many households comprise five or more members.

According to him, a ?3,000 daily household budget for a family of five would amount to about ?600 per person, which he said would be insufficient to provide three meals daily while also meeting expenses such as education, clothing and healthcare.

He also cited data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), which has reported significant increases in the cost of a healthy diet, noting that food expenses represent only part of the financial burden on households.

Onoh said the cost of cooking fuel, potable water, transportation and other necessities further reduces the disposable income of families.

He pointed to rising prices of food items in major markets, including tomatoes, pepper, rice, beans and other staples, as factors that have affected household purchasing power.

He said the affordability of food also varies across regions, with rural households that engage in subsistence farming having different cost structures from residents of major cities such as Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt.

According to Onoh, urban households also contend with fuel costs, transportation fares and energy expenses before meeting their food needs.

He further argued that using the ?70,000 minimum wage as a basis for establishing a ?3,000 daily living budget does not fully capture the financial pressures faced by low-income households.

Onoh said the significant proportion of household income spent on food could limit the ability of families to meet other important needs, including education, healthcare and savings.

He urged policymakers and public commentators to base discussions on the cost of living on broader economic indicators and household realities.

‘The welfare of Nigerians must be treated as a priority of any responsible government and its representatives, and not a privilege,’ he said.

As part of its ongoing effort to foster deeper technical exchange among engineering leaders in the Financial Technology (fintech) industry, Moniepoint has hosted the inaugural ‘Off-the-Record Engineering Mixer for Africa’s Fintech Builders.’

The Moniepoint Off the Record Engineering Mixer was created as an open forum for practitioners to move beyond conventional technical presentations and examine the failures, trade-offs and engineering decisions behind the systems powering financial services.

The engineers had candid conversations around ‘Building for Scale, The Trade-offs of Distributed Systems in Fintech’ and ‘Building Distributed Systems for POS at Scale.’

Held at Moniepoint Headquarters in Victoria Island, Lagos, the mixer convened senior engineering practitioners from across Nigeria’s fintech ecosystem, including Flutterwave, Cowrywise and Nomba.

Discussions examined the realities of operating financial technology infrastructure at scale, including system failures, network dependencies, architectural trade-offs, observability, security and designing for failure.

Moniepoint said convening senior engineering practitioners to examine operational realities reflects its view that the challenges of building at scale in African fintech are shared rather than proprietary, and that the industry improves when the people running these systems compare notes directly.

Moniepoint also used the platform to highlight its approach to building more resilient card payment systems and protecting customers from false debits, guided by a principle that customers should never be left carrying the cost of uncertainty created inside a system they rely on but cannot see into.

Speaking on the engineering philosophy behind this approach, Engineering Manager, Card Payments, Moniepoint, Ayomide Kolawole, said: ‘Building reliable payment infrastructure is about understanding every point at which a transaction can fail, determining what the system knows at each stage and designing the right response when things go wrong.

‘Our responsibility is to ensure that customers are not left carrying the consequences of uncertainty created within a system they rely on.’

Kolawole added that for Moniepoint, the goal is not simply to process transactions quickly, but to make sure that when something goes wrong, the customer experience does not become the cost of that failure.

Moniepoint’s card payments infrastructure processes more than 20 million transactions daily and is built around a deliberate approach to failure. When the system is sufficiently certain that a transaction is unlikely to succeed, it fails fast.

Where the outcome remains uncertain, the system continues to establish what actually happened before presenting a definitive response to the customer.

A key component of this infrastructure continuously evaluates the health of individual issuing banks across individual processors, monitoring success rates and response times in real time.

When a destination crosses a configured threshold, the system automatically stops routing transactions there, reducing prolonged waits and limiting the risk of transactions piling up behind the scenes.

Kolawole explained that the principles behind this approach also connected with the wider discussions at the Mixer.

The sessions, he said, examined the trade-offs that accompany architectural decisions such as sharding, asynchronous processing and service decomposition, with speakers highlighting how solutions designed to address one challenge can introduce new operational and maintenance considerations elsewhere.

Participants agreed that observability and security were similarly essential to understanding system behaviour, identifying emerging risks, and building resilience into financial technology infrastructure.

The sessions reinforced a central principle of engineering at scale. Reliability is not simply about building systems that work. It is about understanding how they fail, designing for uncertainty and ensuring that when failures occur, customers are protected from consequences they should never have to bear.

José Mourinho believes Real Madrid forward Vinicius Jr will produce his best form when he starts scoring more goals.

The Portuguese manager acknowledged the Brazilian’s contributions through assists and his work rate but said goals remained an important part of his game.

‘There is another Vini Jr who eliminated us with Benfica last season, with incredibly good performances in which he scored,’ Mourinho said.

Mourinho added that Vinicius could produce even better performances by combining his creativity and hard work with regular goals.

The comments came as Vinicius continues to play a key role for Real Madrid, with Mourinho challenging the Brazilian to rediscover his scoring form.

Students, parents, teachers and many other stakeholders were stunned at the percentage of candidates who obtained credits in five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics, in the recent West African Senior Secondary Certificate Examination (WASSCE), conducted by the West African Examinations Council (WAEC). Many have called for an independent audit of the process, alleging a variety of challenges.

While acknowledging the significant drop in the percentage of successful candidates, the examination body defends the integrity of its examination process.

According to WAEC’s Head of Nigeria Office, Dr. Amos Dangut, ‘A comparison of the percentage of candidates in this category in WASSCE for School 2024 and 2025, reveal that in this year’s (2026) WASSCE, there is 33.8% decrease in performance – that is, those who obtained credit and above in a minimum of five (5) subjects, including English Language and Mathematics, was 72.12%.’

Dangut emphasised that the council had introduced stricter measures against perennial examination malpractice, stressing that it recently introduced a feature known as ‘serialisation’ in Mathematics, English Language, Biology and Economics, to make collusion among candidates difficult.

Dangut also said the use of Computer-Based Test (CBT) may have contributed to the significant failures. While we submit to the independence of the examination body, it is important that they listen to the calls by stakeholders to thoroughly examine whether something went wrong along the line.

This paper’s analysis of the result showed that out of the 1,969,313 candidates who wrote the examination, in 2026, only 754,545 candidates obtained credits in a minimum of five subjects, including English and Mathematics.

That calls for concern by WAEC, instead of dismissing the outcome of the examination as merely a result of its new anti-cheating mechanisms. To argue in that direction may put a question mark on the integrity of its previous results before the introduction of the serialisation policy.

Following the release of the results, some schools have complained that there were mass failures in other subjects like civic education, government, amongst other subjects, which were not named by WAEC as among the subjects selected for the serialisation project.

That raises a question mark about what actually caused the massive 33.8 decrease in performance in this year’s WASSCE performance.

There are also claims of technical glitches which WAEC has denied. But a glaring challenge, as reported by newspapers, was the late arrival of English Language paper on May 28, in Lagos, Ogun, Osun, and Taraba states, resulting in some candidates allegedly subjected to writing the examination with the aid of lanterns, candles and torch lights. The council had attributed the delay to leakage of the paper, and the effort to protect the integrity of the examination papers.

One complainant called for the cancellation of the examination, which may be an extreme measure. But some observers have proffered potential reasons for the dip in the performance of candidates, and stakeholders should examine whether there is merit in the claims.

The Vice-Chancellor, African School of Economics, Abuja, Prof. Mahfouz Adedimeji, attributed the prevalent failure among pupils to five major factors, which he listed as social, economic, systemic, technological and personal. He said young people spend so much time on social media which he called ‘technoference’, instead of on their studies.

We note that some countries have begun to examine the impact of social media on children; perhaps Nigeria should follow in that direction.

Again, the National President of Association for Formidable Educational Development (AFED), Mr. Emmanuel Orji, said the current education methods may be flawed. He advocated for a review and adjustment of the curriculum, delivery models and assessment methods. He said the decline in performance should not be attributed solely to pupils’ inadequate preparation or poor teaching methods.

He called for a review of the curriculum to make it relevant, inclusive, and aligned with societal needs. In his words: ‘We should enhance assessment methods by exploring alternative evaluation methods that prioritise critical-thinking and creativity. There should be increased access to resources, by providing sufficient study materials, technology, and infrastructure to support learning.’

Again, perhaps it is time for stakeholders to review the nation’s education methods. Of note, while there have been attempts to introduce more practical teaching methods and aids in the curricula, the examination methods seem to remain the same. And the massive infusion of CBT may have conversely reduced the examination of candidates through practical text.

While one advantage may not necessarily be superior to the other, in such circumstance the students who have the innate ability to memorise subjects may have advantage over those with hands-on skills.

Stakeholders should also be interested in the quality of teachers as well as their welfare. The ministries of education at the federal and state levels must unite to examine the quality of the teachers that impact the knowledge that WAEC and other examination bodies test.

A few years ago, when a state in the north-west part of the country tested the quality of teachers in public schools, the result was scandalous. In fact, some of the teachers were as uneducated as the pupils they were recruited to teach.

The challenges in the private schools are even worse. While the quality of teachers in majority of the private schools is low, there is the double challenge of very poor remuneration. Most private schools pay less than half of the national minimum wage, yet they charge exorbitant fees from their pupils. Of course, teachers who are poorly paid will have very low morale to deliver quality education. We urge governments, especially at the state level, to ensure maintenance of standards across board.

While bemoaning the poor WASSEC results this year, a statistical analysis of the results in the past decade shows that it has been a topsy-turvy. In 2015, those who obtained credits and above in a minimum of five subjects, including English Language and Mathematics was 38.68 percent, 52.97 percent in 2016; 59.22 percent in 2017, 48.15 percent in 2018; and 64.18 percent in 2019.

It moved slightly to 65.24 percent in 2020, ramped up to 81.7 percent in 2021, while it reduced to 76.36 percent in 2022. In 2023, the examination body recorded 79.81 percent pass rate, and it reduced to 72.12 in 2024.

The differences in the pass rate deserve the attention of all stakeholders, including the examination body. It is easier to wave off the concerns expressed about the 2026 WASSCE results, but that would be the wrong approach to a development which should be a cause for concern.

While we urge WAEC to engage in internal audit of its examination processes, other stakeholders should examine whether the challenges are lurking elsewhere.

Perhaps we should share the advice of the Director of Platform Schools, Lagos, Dr. Adebola Obe, who said: ‘WAEC and the government should promote a culture that values academic achievement and encourages students to strive for excellence. By working together, we can create an education system that produces students with a solid foundation in academics, preparing them for success in higher education and beyond. This would not only improve the overall quality of education but also enhance the competitiveness of Nigerian graduates in the global job market’.

Ugo Ugochukwu is an American driver, born on April 23rd, 2007 in New York, USA.

He recently won the FIA Formula 3 Championship for Campos.

The 19-year-old Campos Racing driver secured the title at the Madring circuit on Sunday, September 13, 2026, becoming the first Nigerian-American driver to win the FIA Formula 3 championship.

Ugochukwu entered the final race tied on points with British driver Freddie Slater after a dramatic championship battle throughout the season.

His victory at Madring also gives the United States its first FIA Formula 3 champion, adding another milestone to the teenager’s rapidly developing motorsport career.

He now joins a list of former Formula 3 champions who have progressed to Formula 1, including Oscar Piastri and Gabriel Bortoleto.

His championship also represents another significant step in a career that could eventually take him to the highest level of motorsport.

Formula 3 is regarded as an important pathway to Formula 2 and, ultimately, Formula 1.

Following the landmark achievement, Ugochukwu reflected on his Nigerian heritage, which comes through his mother, Oluchi Onweagba.

‘I’m super proud of my Nigerian roots, on my mom’s side,’ he said, while speaking about the significance of his Nigerian connection.

The young driver also expressed pride in having his name recognised by supporters in Africa as his motorsport career continues to gain international attention.

Born and raised in New York City, Ugochukwu is the son of Nigerian fashion model Oluchi Onweagba and her Italian husband, Luca Orlandi. Orlandi is an Italian fashion designer.

Ugochukwu got signed to the McLaren Driver Development Programme at age 13.

Noted for his tall height since his single-seater debut in 2022, Ugochukwu finished third in British F4 for Carlin and second in Italian F4 for Prema.

Ugochukwu graduated to Formula Regional in 2024, and became the first American victor of the Macau Grand Prix in 43 years.

He moved up to FIA Formula 3 with Prema in 2025 and was dropped by McLaren after a winless season; he won the title the following year.

Ugochukwu also began his karting career in USA, winning the Micro ROK Cup USA in 2014 and the Florida Winter Tour in 2015 before moving to Italy to compete in European championships.

He went on to win the X30 Mini category of the IAME International Open in 2017 and the Junior ROK category of the Challenge of the Americas in 2018.

In 2020 he took victory in the FIA OK-Junior European Karting Championship.

Ugochukwu remained with Prema for 2023 competing in the Formula 4 UAE Championship and Italian F4 Championship.

In the UAE championship, he took five wins en route to third in the standings.

In the Italian championship he became vice-champion after fighting Kacper Sztuka for the title until the final round at Vallelunga Circuit.

In 2023 Ugochukwu also became the first champion of the new Euro 4 Championship.

Ugochukwu moved to reigning champions’ Campos Racing for the 2026 season, alongside Théophile Naël and Ernesto Rivera.

Ugochukwu completed the F3 Feature Race at the Madring, P2 to win the F3 drivers championship, defeating Trident Motorsport driver Freddie Slater by 14 points.

Following his victory in the FIA OK-Junior European Karting Championship with the Sauber Karting Team in 2020, Ugochukwu signed a long-term deal with the McLaren Driver Development Programme in 2021 to facilitate his transition from junior motorsport to professional racing driver.

Ugochukwu departed McLaren in November 2025 amidst a major shakeup in the roster.

In June 2026, he tested a Formula One car for the first time, driving the Alpine A524 during a private test session in Monza.

United States President Donald Trump made a pledge last week to send every American adult $5,000 if Republicans retain control of the House of Representatives and Senate in the mid-term elections. It was an extraordinary gambit to reverse his party’s sagging fortunes in the November poll, and it wasn’t clear how he hoped to fund the pledge or whether it was even legal under the country’s law.

Watchers of American political-economy said it would take some $1.3trillion to fulfil the offer to an estimated 270million adult Americans. This portends worsening the country’s nearly $1.8trillion annual budget deficit and compound consumer inflation, against the backdrop of the national debt that topped $40trillion for the first time last month.

Speaking at the GOP’s mid-term convention in Dallas last Wednesday, Trump told the crowd: ‘If the Republicans win, you win with us and you get $5,000. It will be called the Trump dividend.’ He likened the payout to a corporation’s dividends to shareholders, citing ‘our tremendous strength and success economically.’

Within an hour of Trump speaking, Vice President JD Vance assayed tempering the proposal by suggesting the payment would not go to wealthy persons. He also suggested it could be paid for by U.S. tariff revenues, but the amount involved dwarfs what America has received through the protectionist exertions by Trump. ‘We’re taking in an extraordinary amount of revenue because the President of the United States is actually standing up to foreign companies, and also foreign countries that have been taking advantage of America’s workers for pretty much my entire life,’ Vance said in an interview on Fox News. ‘I don’t think it’s a controversial idea. It’s actually the President of the United States saying we’re all working together. We’re all on the same team, and if we continue to create wealth, that wealth is going to go back to the American people,’ he added.

But the math does not add up. A body known as the Bipartisan Policy Center reported that it tracked tariff revenue since Trump began raising rates in 2025 and, as of 8th September, the US had collected about $210billion in tariff and excise tax revenue in 2026. At a rate of $21bn a month, Washington would have to collect tariffs for nearly five years to cover the $5,000 payment promised to American adults – and that is assuming every dollar of tariff revenue went to the payment, and discounting tariff payments refunded to retailers in legal challenges. These calculations put the funding of the proposed payout up in the air.

Many Americans described the proposal as bribery and vote buying. Trump had often lamented that in modern era, the president’s party almost always loses seats in Congress during the mid-terms. ‘We’re going to change that, there’s no reason for it,’ he said. He is looking for unorthodox ways to change the trend, and the dividend proposal is one. Nigeria copied the American political model, but this Trumpian tack is surely something not to be emulated.

The National Chairman of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), Prof. Nentawe Goshwe Yilwatda will lead a high-level delegates to the 7th Africa Public Sector Conference (APSCA 2026).

Tagged: ‘Governance 2030: Delivering Resilient Institutions for a Digital, Green and Secure Africa.’, the conference will place from 14-16 October 2026 at the Kempinski Hotel Gold Coast City in Accra, Ghana.

A statement by the organisers said: ‘Prof. Yilwatda is expected to deliver the keynote address and spearhead the session titled: ‘The Party as Platform: How Governing Parties Can Architect Digital, Green and Secure Governance for 2030,’ with a broader focus on ‘Beyond Elections: The Strategic Mandate of Political Parties in Building Resilient Institutions.’

‘In a formal response to the invitation, the APC National Chairman expressed strong interest in the continental dialogue: ‘I look forward to joining African and international leaders at APSCA 2026 and to sharing Nigeria’s experiences, perspectives, and aspirations as we collectively examine the governance architecture required to build a more resilient, digitally enabled, environmentally sustainable, secure, and prosperous Africa by 2030.

‘The APC considers APSCA 2026 an important opportunity to contribute to a continental dialogue on a question central to sustainable development: how political parties can evolve beyond their traditional role as electoral vehicles to become enduring institutions capable of providing strategic policy direction, sustaining reform agendas, strengthening democratic governance, and helping to build institutions that deliver measurable and lasting improvements in the lives of citizens.’

‘The former Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Reduction further affirmed that APSCA 2026 offers a fitting stage to project Nigeria’s development trajectory under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda to a continental and global audience.

‘We see this as an opportunity to present Nigeria not only as a market of immense potential, but also as a country actively developing ideas, institutions, and solutions capable of contributing to Africa’s broader development journey,’ he said.

‘Reacting to the APC’s official acceptance, Akin Naphtal, Convener and Host of APSCA, Group Chief Executive Officer of InstinctWave Group, welcomed this development as a defining moment for the conference’s 2026 edition.

‘Having the All Progressives Congress and Prof. Nentawe Yiltwada on the APSCA 2026 platform is exactly the calibre of engagement this conference was built for,’ Naphtal said. ‘This is not just about Nigeria showing up in Accra, it is about a governing party stepping forward to say that institutions, not just elections, are the real currency of development. That conversation deserves a continental stage, and we are proud to build it.’

Naphtal further noted that this reflects the very theme of the year’s conference. ‘Governance 2030 is about resilient institutions for a digital, green and secure Africa. When a party as significant as the APC chooses to engage that conversation directly, and back it with a Pavilion, a documentary and real institutional participation, it validates why we created APSCA in the first place: to give African governance its own stage, on its own terms,’ he said. ‘We look forward to welcoming Prof. Yiltwada and the Nigerian delegation to Accra.’

‘With the previous six editions done across Rwanda, Botswana, South Africa, Ghana, and Kenya, APSCA 2026 will be graced by top public sector leaders from more than 10 African nations, at which there will be twelve (12) forums covering governance and institutional leadership, women in the public sector, energy, public procurement, public finance, trade, digital government, education, public-private partnerships, ESG and sustainability, customer experience, and youth empowerment, to examine how continent institutions can deliver coordinated, future-ready public value.’