Former Rivers State governor and ex-Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, has said the standard of living in Nigeria has deteriorated under the administration of President Bola Tinubu.
Amaechi made the remarks on Tuesday while speaking at a protest at the National Assembly against the Senate’s rejection of real-time electronic transmission of election results.
The protest, organised by civil society organisations and political actors, is demanding amendments to the Electoral Act to make real-time electronic transmission of results compulsory ahead of the 2027 general election.
Addressing demonstrators and journalists, Amaechi, who recently defected from the All Progressives Congress (APC) to the African Democratic Congress (ADC), accused the Tinubu-led government of deepening economic hardship and tolerating corruption.
“Is life easier now than when I was in the APC? Life is worse now than during the former President Buhari regime,” he said.
“In Buhari’s time, at least, even though we were planning to remove subsidy, we had better plans for citizens,” Amaechi added.
He also alleged large-scale corruption under the current administration.
“The corruption here is too much. They are stealing. I heard there’s a $16 billion road project awarded without due process. I left APC already and they will not win,” he said.
Amaechi further questioned the administration’s chances in the next election cycle.
“I don’t know whether there was corruption back then, but the corruption here… let’s see if Tinubu will win again in 2027,” he stated.
The protests at the National Assembly began on Monday, with Peter Obi, the Labour Party’s presidential candidate in the 2023 election, leading one group of demonstrators.
On Wednesday, the Senate retained the provision for electronic transfer of election results as contained in the Electoral Act 2022. During deliberations on the amendment bill, lawmakers rejected proposals for real-time transmission of results and a 10-year ban on vote-buying, opting instead to keep existing penalties, including fines or imprisonment.
Although several senators later clarified that the bill was supported by a majority of the chamber, the Senate ultimately declined to adopt mandatory real-time transmission. Instead, it retained the existing wording in the 2022 Act, which allows results to be transferred “in a manner as prescribed by the commission.”
