Special Adviser on Media and Public Communications to the President Sunday Dare has urged Nigerians to treat the US State Department’s 2026 Fiscal Transparency Report as a narrow compliance exercise rather than a full appraisal of the country’s public‑finance reforms under President Bola Tinubu.
In a statement Thursday responding to the report—which judged Nigeria as failing to meet the department’s minimum fiscal‑transparency standards and found “no significant progress” during the review period, Dare said the document measures countries against specific US criteria and therefore should not be read as a comprehensive audit of the current administration’s reform agenda.
“The US Fiscal Transparency Report is a specific assessment against the Department of State’s minimum fiscal‑transparency requirements, particularly the public disclosure of national budget information, government contracts and natural‑resource licenses,” Dare said.
“It should therefore not be interpreted as a comprehensive assessment of all fiscal and public‑financial‑management reforms currently underway in Nigeria.”
He noted the report itself acknowledged some advances, including wider availability of budget documents and more public debt disclosures.
Areas singled out by Washington included procurement disclosure, budget‑execution reporting and audit processes—are, Dare said, the subject of ongoing institutional reforms of the government.
“Fiscal transparency, accountability and effective public financial management remain important priorities of the Federal Government,” he added.
The presidential spokesman pointed to initiatives such as an open‑treasury platform, expanded public budget documentation and newly published debt data.
The government, he said, is also strengthening digital procurement systems to make fiscal information more timely and reliable.
Dare described the US report as an external benchmark rather than a definitive verdict.
“The appropriate response, therefore, is neither to dismiss the findings nor to portray them as a complete characterization of Nigeria’s fiscal governance,” he said.
“Rather, the report provides an external benchmark against which existing reforms can be further strengthened.”
He reiterated the administration’s commitment to improving the speed and quality of fiscal reporting, bolstering audit institutions and widening access to procurement information to give citizens, investors and other stakeholders clearer visibility into public‑resource management.
