Obi faults $9m lobbying spend, says Nigeria chooses optics over human lives

Former Anambra State Governor and Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, has criticised what he described as Nigeria’s persistent preference for wasteful spending over human wellbeing, warning that the country’s deepening development crisis is the outcome of poor leadership choices, not a shortage of funds.

In a statement personally signed by him, Obi said reports that Nigeria spent about $9 million on foreign lobbyists in Washington highlighted a troubling pattern of deploying public resources to manage international perception while living conditions at home continue to deteriorate.

According to him, such expenditure reflects a culture of misplaced priorities that has helped entrench Nigeria’s failing development status.

“This is merely a small example of wasteful spending that has contributed to our nation’s current failing status,” Obi said.

He noted that Nigeria has remained stuck in the low Human Development Index (HDI) category for 35 years, from 1990 to 2025, despite having better economic prospects than some peer countries at the start of that period.

Obi recalled that in 1990, Nigeria’s per capita income was three times higher than China’s, yet China and Indonesia have since moved from low to medium, and now to high HDI categories, while Nigeria has stagnated.

“The achievements of these nations were not the result of fate, miracles or natural endowments, but a consequence of deliberate choices and the cumulative effects of good and bad leadership,” he said.

Focusing on health, one of the key indicators of human development, Obi painted a grim picture of Nigeria’s current realities, describing them as evidence of the cost of repeated misjudgments by those in power.

He said Nigeria now has the lowest life expectancy globally and ranks among the top two countries in maternal mortality, making childbirth increasingly dangerous for Nigerian women.

“Instead of investing in life-saving systems, we spend millions trying to obscure our failures,” he stated.

Obi argued that the $9 million reportedly spent on foreign lobbyists could have been channelled into critical healthcare infrastructure with immediate and measurable impact.

According to him, the amount would be enough to fund the entire 2024 capital budget of at least one major teaching hospital in each geopolitical zone, significantly improving survival rates, quality of care and life expectancy.

“The funds are available; what is lacking are prioritisation, discipline and effective leadership,” he said.

He stressed that public funds must be deployed to directly serve citizens rather than sustain illusions of progress.

“Every naira of taxpayers’ money should serve the Nigerian people. Instead, citizens are dying in failing hospitals while the government pays foreigners to pretend that everything is fine,” Obi added.

Calling for a shift in national priorities, the former governor warned that Nigeria cannot afford to continue ignoring reality.

“We cannot continue to live in an illusion while our reality deteriorates. This constant prioritisation of trivial matters must come to an end,” he said.