Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has criticized President Bola Tinubu’s claim that borrowing is not leprosy, stating that the nation’s growing debt is worse than the disease since its effects reach generations yet unborn.
Obasanjo, who obtained the historic $30bn Paris Club debt relief for Nigeria while in office between 1999 and 2007, noted that although leprosy affects one person, excessive borrowing puts the future of whole generations at risk.
He made the remarks on Friday at the 3rd Ajibosin Annual Symposium, themed “Leveraging Artificial Intelligence to Solve Grassroots Problems and Accelerate National Development,” which took place at the amphitheater of the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library in Abeokuta.
Tinubu was recently reported to have said that borrowing is not leprosy, maintaining that his administration only needed to work hard to repay whatever it borrowed.
Obasanjo, however, dismissed the argument as absolute nonsense, questioning the country’s growing debt burden and the ability of its leaders to manage the economy.
The former president also took aim at the policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, contending that they were not crafted to advance Nigeria’s national development and prosperity.
He said, “I was sitting with the former Prime Minister of Britain, Jimmy Callaghan. Callaghan was a sheep farmer. He was being paid four euros per annum on every sheep he owned, and they say we must never subsidize agriculture, and if we subsidize agriculture, we won’t get money from the World Bank or from the IMF.
“World Bank and IMF were not designed for us. They were built before we became independent, and that’s the people who will determine what we do. They are brilliant boys and girls; they went to Ivy League universities, Oxford, Cambridge, and all that. My children went to some of them, including Iyabo. She went to one of those schools; she went to Cornell.
“How can Iyabo be the one who will tell me how I will run my home? These brilliant boys will package everything very well academically. They tell us, and we take it, lock, stock, and barrel, and we use it. For a country of 250 million people, it is boys and girls who are not even married, let alone manage a home, who will tell us what we will do to manage our people, our country, and we swallow it, and we destroy ourselves.”
Obasanjo also decried the loss of value of the naira, saying, “When I started my farm 47 years ago, one naira to the dollar was one naira to one dollar and 85 cents. What has Nigeria done in 47 years that we now have N1,500 to the dollar? What have we done?
“What do our leaders know, and what do they not know? From what they know, what can they do for us? For anybody to say debt is no leprosy is absolute nonsense. Debt is worse than leprosy, because leprosy destroys only one person. Debt destroys generations.”
The former president also cautioned the nation against adopting artificial intelligence and other technologies without grasping their consequences, contending that innovations brought in by powerful foreign nations could turn into tools of exploitation should Africans fail to take control of them.
Obasanjo stated that the country has to decide how artificial intelligence will support its development priorities, instead of letting foreign interests shape its technological and economic path.
He pointed to the misuse of AI-generated content as an early sign of the risks tied to the technology, maintaining that Nigeria needs to put sufficient safeguards in place before embracing innovations.
He remarked, “I don’t know too much technically about AI. But I know that anything that is not in your control can be abused against you.”
Speaking at the symposium, historian and political commentator Dr. Umar Ardo cautioned that Africa could become a victim of a new kind of economic exploitation through AI if the continent did not take charge of its data, technological infrastructure, and intellectual property.
Ardo noted that while AI presents vast opportunities for economic transformation and national development, adopting it without ownership, sufficient safeguards, and local capacity could sustain the unequal economic relationships that defined slavery, colonialism, and post-independence dependency.
He said, “For over three centuries, Africa’s principal export was human beings. The transatlantic slave trade carried roughly twelve million Africans across the ocean. The technology of that era sailing ships, navigational compasses, and firearms that enabled this trade was not ours. We did not build the ships, set the prices, or write the ledgers, though our men, women, and children filled the cargoes.
“The most sophisticated technologies of the age were harnessed by others to extract what they valued most: human labor.”
“Under colonialism, the export changed from people to land and raw materials tin, coal, cocoa, palm oil, groundnuts, cotton, ivory, and gold. The technology then explosives, railways linking mines to ports, steam engines, and colonial administrative systems served an extractive economy. We supplied resources and labor; others controlled the machinery and captured much of the value.”
He argued that this pattern persisted after independence, as African nations exported raw materials while importing finished goods and relied on foreign economies for technology, expertise, and industrial capacity.
He observed that the country kept exporting crude oil while relying on imported refined petroleum products, just as cocoa-producing nations continued to depend heavily on foreign manufacturers for finished chocolate goods.
He added, “Stand back and see the arc: human beings, raw materials, unprocessed commodities, and skilled labor. In every age, Africa has been the quarry and not the miner, the farm and not the factory, the source and not the beneficiary. We were repeatedly assured that each new arrangement was different, fair, and mutually beneficial.
“Now comes the age of artificial intelligence, which Africa is urged to ‘leverage.’ I do not dispute its arrival or its potential. I ask whether we have considered the terms of participation. Data may become the fourth commodity in this long history of extraction.
“Data generated by our people, farms, hospitals, languages, businesses, and public institutions is increasingly valuable, yet computing infrastructure, models, intellectual property, and profits remain concentrated elsewhere.”
