Nigeria's Tinubu Backs $12m Abuja Entrepreneurship Centre

President Bola Tinubu has welcomed a $12 million entrepreneurship centre planned for Abuja, calling the project a boost for Nigeria's micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and a source of new jobs.

The endorsement was reported by Channels Television. Tinubu hailed the $12 million Abuja Entrepreneurship Centre and said the project would help MSMEs grow and create employment, according to the broadcaster's report.

The announcement positions the centre as one of the more concrete private-side commitments to Nigerian enterprise development in the capital in recent months. Nigeria's MSME sector accounts for the bulk of the country's businesses, and successive administrations have looked to entrepreneurship programmes as a lever against unemployment.

The $12 million figure marks the scale of the commitment. Channels Television reported that Tinubu framed the project as a jobs creator — a central pledge of his administration's economic agenda as the country grapples with high unemployment and cost-of-living pressures.

Details of the funding structure, the developer behind the centre, and a construction timeline were not disclosed in the report. What is known is the headline number, the location, and the stated aim: supporting MSMEs and generating employment.

For Nigeria's small-business community in and around the Federal Capital Territory, the centre could offer training, workspace, and access to support services — the type of infrastructure that entrepreneurship advocates have long argued is missing at scale. The Tinubu administration has made MSME development a recurring theme in its economic policy statements.

The project's true test will come in execution: whether the $12 million translates into facilities that entrepreneurs actually use, and jobs that materialise on the timeline officials suggest.