Nigeria in 2026: Trends and Prospects

Beneath the Surface By Dakuku Peterside

Nigeria enters 2026 like a tired household facing a new month: calculations on the table, anxieties in the room, promises hanging like unpaid bills. Everyone senses it—the year won’t be quiet. The 2027 general elections already cast a long shadow, rarely confined to the campaign trail. It spreads into party structures, courtrooms, legislatures, budgets, and boardrooms. It seeps into cement prices and transport costs. It appears in how public officials speak—less as stewards, more as contestants in a power relay where survival is the prize.So, 2026 is unlikely to be a year of calm. Instead, it will become a year of contestation—over nominations, over laws, over legitimacy, over who controls what, and by what means. The nation’s defining question will not simply be “who is winning?” but “what is breaking in the process?”Start with the ruling party. The APC faces a sharpening dilemma: as the biggest tent, it is also the largest battleground. Congresses, primaries, governorship ambitions, and National Assembly calculations will collide. The struggle is less about ideology and more about structures: who controls delegates, owns the ticket machinery, and defines ‘consensus’ versus ‘imposition.’ In Nigeria, parties often outsource internal disagreements to the judiciary, so the APC’s disputes will quickly become national events—parallel congresses, countersuits, injunctions, and accusations of betrayal that really signal defeat.Simultaneously, alternatives grow in the cracks of a dominant party. In 2026, the opposition will be driven by opportunity, though it will remain fragmented by personalities and ambitions. Where citizens feel squeezed by hardship, opposition addressing lived realities—food prices, transport poverty, declining purchasing power—will sound less like “politics” and more like relief. New platforms and coalitions will try to appear as credible vehicles for power. Whether they succeed is beside the point. What matters is that 2026 will be more competitive, unpredictable, and volatile.That volatility will push the judiciary into the political centre—again. In an ideal democracy, courts are referees; in a strained one, they become replacement arenas. As a result, intra-party disputes, contested congresses, and the early battles of 2027 will fall to judges’ attention. This is how our system has evolved: when political actors struggle to build legitimacy among members and citizens, they seek it through judgments and injunctions. But the cost is enormous. The more the judiciary is dragged into party quarrels, the more citizens suspect politicisation. As suspicion grows, judicial authority weakens—even in matters unrelated to elections. Ultimately, a country cannot build investor confidence, social order, or civic trust on a judiciary that large sections of the public view as a political instrument.The legislature cannot escape 2027’s pull. In Nigeria, lawmakers are most pliant when re-election anxiety peaks. As ticket season begins, oversight often gives way to silence, and independence yields to compliance. It is easier to rush controversial bills than to seek consensus. It is easier to protect the executive than the public, especially when party structures and nomination processes punish a ‘stubborn’ legislator.This is why the year is likely to open with legislation as controversy, not consensus—particularly around taxation. The tax reform laws scheduled to take effect on 1 January 2026 have already sparked a national debate over process, textual integrity, and trust. Reports show that civil society groups and some lawmakers have demanded an independent probe into alleged discrepancies between what the National Assembly passed and what was later gazetted, while the Presidency has publicly distanced itself from claims of executive interference. Taiwo Oyedele, chair of the presidential tax reform committee, has also denied that the gazetted laws were altered and has attempted to clarify what is circulated and what is authoritative.Now, beyond who is right, one truth stands taller than the dispute: in a low-trust society, process is not a technicality, it is legitimacy. When citizens suspect laws can change shape between passage and publication, they do not just resist a particular law; they begin to distrust the entire lawmaking system. Taxation, more than most policies, depends on consent. While a state can coerce taxes, it cannot coerce trust. When taxation meets distrust, compliance becomes resentment, and resentment grows into civic sabotage.The economy will carry the burden of all this institutional strain. Nigerians have lived through a bruising stretch—subsidy removal shocks, currency pressures, inflation, and the quiet collapse of small businesses that die without headlines. In 2026, the government will speak more loudly about reforms, stabilisation, and “pain for gain.” Yet people will continue to ask a simpler question: where is the gain?Fiscal realities explain why that question persists. President Tinubu’s proposed 2026 federal budget—about ₦58.18 trillion—includes ₦15.52 trillion for debt service and a projected deficit of roughly 4.28% of GDP. These are not mere numbers; they signal a national mood: a state pursuing big goals while burdened with interest, a government advocating discipline amid tight constraints, and a society seeking relief as fiscal space narrows.And then there is the larger debt shadow. The Debt Management Office reported Nigeria’s public debt at ₦152.4 trillion as of 30 June 2025. In these conditions, 2026 becomes a year of pressure: pressure on federal authorities to show that borrowing delivers outcomes; pressure on state governments to fabricate achievements before 2027; and pressure on citizens, who are told to endure more without evidence.This is where governance’s moral dimension is unavoidable. Nigerians are not angry only because life is hard; after all, life has been hard before. Rather, they are angry because hardship is now unfair pain below and insulation above. When reform means sacrifice, citizens expect it to be shared. They want restraint at the top, transparency in procurement, and honesty in public accounts. They want savings tracked, not just announced. Above all, they want evidence, not rhetoric.Yet, 2026 will not be only a year of danger. It will also be a year of openings. This is because governments under electoral pressure often build faster, spend louder, and pursue visible projects. As a result, state governments will scramble to show performance: roads, power interventions, agriculture programmes, security architecture, and social welfare. Some of this will be genuine development; some will be hurried expenditure dressed as legacy. For businesses and investors, the environment will be active.Three sectors will remain especially promising despite macroeconomic stress.Agriculture, especially agro-processing and value-chain infrastructure, will attract attention because food insecurity is now both an economic and political risk. In contrast, technology will continue its ascent because the youth economy is not waiting for government efficiency. Fintech, digital services, and innovation hubs will expand, as long as regulation is clear enough to permit scale. Finally, power—renewables, mini-grids, embedded generation, and credible distribution partnerships—will remain central because unreliable energy is a hidden tax on every enterprise. These opportunities, investors will need to navigate familiar hazards. These include policy inconsistency, regulatory surprises, insecurity, and the politics of permits and contracts. In 2026, agility will matter as much as capital. Risk intelligence will be as important as strategy.Nigeria’s external environment will also reshape the stakes. The global contest for critical minerals—lithium, cobalt, rare earths—combined with a more protectionist trade climate, is rewriting supply chains and geopolitical alignments. The International Energy Agency has repeatedly warned about high concentration in critical mineral refining and processing, noting that China is the leading refiner of 19 out of 20 strategic minerals, with an average market share of around 70%, and that concentration risks are becoming real through export controls and trade tensions.For Nigeria, this global scramble can be a door or a trap. Specifically, it is a door if Nigeria uses its resources to build local value addition, transparent licensing, and processing capacity, thereby creating jobs and industrial depth. Conversely, it is a trap if Nigeria remains a raw-material exporter and imports finished goods at a premium. Government statements and policy signals show an intention to push local processing and value addition in the solid minerals sector, including licensing reforms that prioritise in-country beneficiation. Ultimately, whether that intention grows into a credible system—predictable, corruption-resistant, and investable—will determine if 2026 marks the start of an industrial pivot or just the next chapter of extraction without development.So what should Nigerians watch in 2026, then?Watch party processes—because internal democracy in parties shapes the quality of democracy in the country. Watch the judiciary—because every overreach or perceived bias weakens the last institution citizens run to when politics burns. Watch the legislature—because a pliant parliament is how controversial decisions become law without consent. Watch the budget—not only for what it promises, but for what it funds, what it hides, and what it postpones. Watch anti-corruption not as a slogan, but as a pattern: who is investigated, who is protected, and whether consequences ever arrive.Most importantly, watch the relationship between taxation and trust. A state can raise revenue, but it cannot sustain legitimacy without transparency, due process, and moral credibility. If 2026 becomes a year in which laws are rushed, citizens are squeezed, and elites remain untouched, then 2027 will not merely be an election; it will be a referendum on whether Nigerians still believe the system can be corrected from within.In the end, 2026 will be an audition year. It will reveal whether our institutions can hold under pressure, whether our reforms can earn trust, and whether our politics can compete without consuming the republic. The future is already watching. And so are the people.

*Dakuku Peterside is the author of two new bestselling books, Leading in a Storm and Beneath the Surface.