After Venezuela, Nigeria could be next – Oye cautions against over-reliance on US, other foreign partners

THE Chairman of the Alliance for Economic Research and Ethics (AERE), Dele Kelvin Oye, has warned that Nigeria risks becoming the next target after Venezuela if the country continues its overreliance on the United States and other foreign partners.

According to him, “If we’re not careful with our current unrestrained, bloated govern-ment recurrent expenditures, borrowings/deficit financing, and unnecessary reliance on IMF and World Bank prescriptions, the US could easily use our current joint war on insurgency to treat Nigeria like Venezuela in the event of loan default, like a distressed asset waiting for a takeover.”

Oye, who is the immediate Past Chairman of the Organised Private Sector of Nigeria(OPSN) and Chairman of the Nigeria-Türkiye Business Council (NTBC), disclosed this in a policy paper titled “After the Repo-Man Cometh: Nigeria’s American Romance and the Don-Row Doctrine of Asset Liquidation.”

Describing Nigeria’s current posture as “dancing with the tiger,” Oye noted that while foreign security assistance may offer short-term relief, it creates long-term structural vulnerabilities that undermine sovereignty.

He stressed that unless Nigeria urgently reduces its cost of governance, curbs deficit financing, and builds internal economic resilience, external powers could eventually frame Nigeria’s natural resources as “unrecovered property of creditors.”

He said, “The current grand scene of international relations has shifted outrageously, the US’s Repo-Man approach to international relations. Imagine a world where countries are like cars, and the US is the repo-man, swooping in to take whatever they consider “theirs” when interest/instalmental payments are missed. Sounds wild, right?

That’s the situation with the US invasion of Venezuela on January 3rd, 2026, and it could easily be Nigeria’s story too, especially with our current romance with the US on counter-insurgency efforts.”

“Here’s the deal: Nigeria has resources, and the US wants them. If we’re not careful with our current unrestrained, bloated government recurrent expenditures, borrowings/deficit financing, and unnecessary reliance on IMF and World Bank prescriptions, the US could easily use our current joint war on insurgency to treat Nigeria like Venezuela on the event of loan default, like a distressed asset waiting for a takeover.

The US’s actions in Venezuela should be a wake-up call for us. We are dancing with the tiger, hoping it’ll be gentle, but what if it isn’t? We need to wean ourselves off foreign “partnerships,” loans, and start taking our sovereignty seriously. It’s time to diversify, invest in ourselves, and stop relying on others to save us.

“Our resources are worth more than just a quick fix; let’s make sure we’re protecting them for the long haul. We should consciously avoid a scenario where we give the opportunity for countries or multilateral institutions to use the current global economic imperialistic narrative to paint Nigeria’s natural resources as the “unrecovered property of the external powers/creditors.”

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