Nigeria’s inflation soars to 22.41 percent in May

By Kazeem Ugbodaga

Nigeria’s inflation has soared to 22.41 percent in the month of May, 2023, report from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) says on Thursday.

According to the NBS, in May 2023, the headline inflation rate increased to 22.41% relative to April 2023 headline inflation rate which was 22.22%.

The NBS said looking at the movement, the May 2023 inflation rate showed an increase of 0.19% points when compared to April 2023 headline inflation rate.

Similarly, it said on a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 4.70% points higher compared to the rate recorded in May 2022, which was (17.71%).

‘This shows that the headline inflation rate (year-on-year basis) increased in the month of May 2023 when compared to the same month in the preceding year (i.e., May 2022).

“Likewise, on a month-on-month basis, the headline inflation rate in May 2023 was 1.94%, which was 0.03% higher than the rate recorded in April 2023 (1.91%).

“This means that in the month of May 2023, on the average, the general price level was 0.03% higher relative to April 2023,” the NBS added.

It said the percentage change in the average CPI for the twelve months period ending May 2023 over the average of the CPI for the previous twelve months period was 21.20%, showing 4.75% increase compared to 16.45% recorded in May 2022.