As we look back at the closing days of 2025, one reality has dominated the Nigerian landscape more than any other: our changing climate.
This year, the environment wasn’t just a “topic”—it was a crisis of record-breaking floods, scorching heatwaves, and a deepening gap between global promises and local reality.
From the halls of international summits to the front lines of flooded farmlands, the question remains: who pays for a crisis they didn’t create?
In 2025, climate change didn’t just knock on Nigeria’s door—it broke it down. National emergency data paint a grim picture: hundreds of thousands of Nigerians were forced from their homes this year (show infor graphics)
Floods washed away critical roads and bridges, while in the North, a relentless dry spell choked the life out of food supply.
But here is the bitter irony. Nigeria’s carbon footprint is barely a smudge on the global map. While the entire African continent contributes less than four percent of global emissions—and Nigeria less than one percent—poor and developing countries like Nigeria are paying the highest price.
That disparity fueled a fiery year of African diplomacy. It is an advocacy Nigeria and other Aftican states pushed forcefully even at the 2025 international climate talks
For many years, wealthy nations have promised one hundred billion dollars annually to help developing countries adapt.
In 2025, investigations revealed that the cheque is still in the mail. Experts say what little money did arrive was often just repackaged as aid or—worse—loans that only add to Nigeria’s suffocating debt.
Nigeria is not alone, though. At the last climate talks in Brazil, the UN Secretary General gave this sobering reminder to world leaders and the world’s top carbon emitters.
The frustrations are already boiling over in most poor countries.
Nigerian activists and civil society groups found a new, unified voice. They aren’t just asking for “help” anymore; they are demanding climate reparations.
Despite the lack of international support, Nigeria didn’t stand still in 2025. It began its own efforts to reduce emissions as part of its commitments to clean energy with a massive push toward Compressed Natural Gas, or CNG.
The government ramped up conversion centres with the broad objective of moving public transport fleets away from petrol. But experts caution against outselling its climate benefits
Analysts, however, say progress isn’t moving at the required pace due to funding bottlenecks, which has made even the “Loss and Damage” fund—the global pot of money meant to compensate for irreversible climate destruction almost inaccessible
The final audit of 2025 reveals a paradox: Nigeria has the ambition and the solutions, but the Global North still holds the purse strings.
And those strings are tied in knots of conditions and debt.
Editor: Ebuwa Omo-Osagie
