What the figure does not say.

11.66.

That's NISER's forecast for Nigeria's headline inflation rate by the end of 2026. Down from 15.15 percent at end-2025. Down from the worst of 2024, when it touched above 30 percent.

The number is a genuine improvement. Anyone who was watching Nigeria's economy in 2023 and 2024 knows that. Inflation that peaked above 30 percent and is now forecast at 11.66 is not a small movement.

Here's what 11.66 doesn't say.

It doesn't say that food inflation is still running above 20 percent in Enugu, Kwara, and Adamawa today, right now, the day you're reading this. Headline inflation is an average. Averages hide where the pain is landing.

It doesn't say what 11.66 means for someone who lost ground in the years when the number was 24, 28, 30 percent. If your salary didn't grow in those years, you lost real purchasing power. 11.66 going forward doesn't recover that. It just stops the bleeding getting worse at the same speed.

It doesn't say that the reform pain has been distributed evenly. The households that felt the subsidy removal most were the ones with the least capacity to absorb it.

The forecasters are not lying. The model is probably right about direction. What it can't do is reach back and return to a family in Kogi State what they spent in 2024 just to survive.

11.66 is a forecast. Eid this week is an audit. The number that comes back from that audit is different.