Former Senate President, Bukola Saraki, has revealed that he faced considerable political resistance for scrutinising foreign loan requests during the administration of late former President Muhammadu Buhari.
Saraki said the pushback stemmed from a system that was not structured to allow adequate scrutiny of the purpose and impact of external borrowing.
The former Kwara State governor, who served as Senate President between 2015 and 2019, said promoting fiscal accountability and institutional reforms was a key focus of his leadership of the National Assembly.
He made the remarks on Tuesday while speaking at the Global Strategic Advisory Group meeting held at Villa La Collina in Lake Como, Italy, during a panel session titled, “Development Policies—Withdrawal of the U.S. from International Development: Opportunities and Challenges.”
Saraki noted that Nigeria’s low tax-to-GDP ratio remains one of the country’s greatest challenges to achieving sustainable development.
According to him, the Senate under his leadership prioritised fiscal oversight through measures such as open budget hearings, efforts to address unremitted government revenues outside the treasury system, and reforms aimed at improving governance in the petroleum sector.
“During my tenure as Senate President, we placed strong emphasis on fiscal oversight, introducing open budget hearings, confronting the issue of unremitted revenues held outside the treasury system, and working on petroleum sector governance reform,” he said.
“These were not easy fights. But they were necessary ones, because the alternative is permanent external dependency.”
Saraki recalled that his efforts to challenge foreign loan approvals often attracted political backlash.
“I experienced this firsthand when, as Senate President of Nigeria, I challenged the executive on foreign loan approvals and received significant political push-back because the system was not designed to support proper scrutiny of purpose or impact,” he said.
He added that many of the loans were treated as though they carried no future burden despite the obligation to repay them.
“Many of these loans were accepted as if they were free gifts, yet repayment obligations remained,” Saraki stated.
