If you must ask the people to fast, then you should not be
feasting. PO
at the 3rd &4th joint Convocation Ceremonies of Dominican University, Ibadan
The
reformer and his charmed circle must be seen to be making sacrifices too and
show empathy by words and deeds…Their spending lacks prudence and is out of
sync with the reform laboratory… Dr
Agu Onwuzuroha, reacting to ‘Reforms without reliefs’
an editorial by Dataphyte
Woe to you shepherds who only take care of
yourselves. Should the shepherds not take care of the flock? You eat the curd,
clothe yourselves with wool and slaughter the choice animals but you do not
take care of the flock. You have not
strengthened the weak or healed the sick
or bound up the injured. You have not brought back the strays or searched for
the lost. You have ruled them harshly and brutally. So they were scattered
because they was no shepherd… and they became food for wild animals (Eziekiel,
34:1-5)
2024 has gone. It was a year of the renewed hope
agenda and sure, there were many policy pronouncements and loud launching of several government intents(
intents, not attainments). There were official evidences that
Nigeria was on its way to eldorado and several BATists regaled us
with what one of my friends called his AUDACIOUS
reforms and hitherto unimaginable positive outcomes. The great BAT himself mocked us for living
false and frivolous lives before he came on board, exemplifying this with a
friend of his who descended from Ferrari to, may be, a tokumboh honda. He also
reminded us that poverty and the
attendant hunger were not limited to Nigeria. However, with the eyes of an elder,
who is also a FULL man and a FULL spirit, what I
saw in 2024 was a weird commingling of epicurean
feasting and Biafra-level
starvation ,
Nothing exposed
the fasting side of this equation than the desperate and deadly quest for rice in the last days of the
year, where our compatriots were ‘eaten while looking for what to eat’
(Lasisi Olagunju, 23/12/24). The devil appeared tired of the gradual process of
populating hell and so he came down, live, to quickly take more of us and by
doing so, exposed the fallacy that ALL was well with Nigeria and Nigerians
because this happened in the quest for ordinary rice! The how and why of this ‘RICEMANIA’
is a story for another day because while I was growing up, rice was eaten at
most 52 times in a year; only on Sundays, except when feast days like Christmas or Easter fell within the week!!
And while Nigerians
are suffering from Acute Ricemania,
while rice is the only solution to any humanitarian crises in Nigeria, it is
worthy to note that Ghanaian youths rejected the
political rice, saying ; give us jobs not rice! In
Nigeria however, desparation, dependency and tragic struggle for
survival, where a mere 5kg cups of rice( not bag) presented as
palliatives sympolises weaponisation of poverty… grinding poverty; A society
where poverty has eroded dignity and stripped millions of the capacity to
resist exploitation, Pervassive poverty leaves citizens with little choice but
to accept handouts, even as they acknowledge the inadequacy of such measures.
Hunger has eroded our dignity to the extent that even the smallest relief is
seen as precious: (Chris Agbedo, two sides of rice in Ghana and
Nigeria). Any way, I digressed!
Within a few days towards the expiration 2024, Nigeria, a land literally flowing with milk and honey, witnessed in quick succession, the needless death of its citizens in a desperate struggle for momentary assuagement of hunger by some good-hearted individuals and organisations. In Ibadan, a programme with a promise of N5000+ and planned for 5000 people was attended by about 75000, with some keeping vigil at the venue so as to improve their chances. Some were even reported to have come from neighbouring states, but I doubt this, given the prevalent cost of transportation. At Abuja, about 10 people died as they struggled for rice and other items shared ( as has always been done) by the Holy Trinity Catholic Church. At Okija, 21 souls perished as they struggled for rice, which Obijackson has been distributing for years . The figures were oscillating but from these three incidents, which happened within 72 hours, we lost about 70 people, vicariously to hunger, because they died while seeking for solution to hunger!
Some government apologists and independent observers held that they died due to indiscipline, greed and poor crowd control management. Others showed us evidence that even in Canada, there were poverty alleviation programmes. I however posit that due to our wonderful economic performance( 3.5% GDP growth and still counting!), the population of the wretched of the earth( Nigerian Division) ballooned to unimaginable level and consequently the desperation index of Nigerians rose to a frightening crescendo! That was why people were trampling others to death so as to obtain the new gold and that was why more people trudged on even when some of those before them had died. Guardian captured this point succinctly when it asserted that Apart from the culture of disorderliness, at the centre of the desperation of those who went for free food and other gifts was a high level of hunger in the land caused by government economic policies… , the cost of living has become extremely high,sending thousands of Nigerians( just thousands?) into extreme poverty… millions of Nigerians can no longer afford basic foodstuffs. (Weekend Guardian, January 18/19, 2025). Jesus wept! The Son of Man ALSO wept because these were preventable deaths since this is a land flowing with milk and honey, where our leaders and their acolytes are spending money as if it were going out of fashion. Sadly, as they were feasting, we were fasting or rather starving (fasting rhymes better).
2024 was a year in which the gap between cost of living and the standard of living widened frighteningly because of what Peterside called the ‘Hike Economy’. The government, with a Zaccheaus Mentality and claiming to have inherited a dilapidated economy, believed that the price of everything MUST be hiked and in multiples of 100%. There were hikes in the prices of fuel, cooking and industrial gas, exchange and interest rates, transportation, food, power and all these led to an inflationary rate ( 34.8%)that had not be seen in the past 3 decades. It appeared as if the government deliberately engaged in a policy of mass pauperisation and for politrictians, this made the weaponisation of poverty, a more attractive strategy. And while they bought a vote for N5000 in Edo State, that amount was less than N1000 the other day and our people who suffer from quantity illusion and are in such a sorry state, could not even ask for more. As the year ended, everything became ONLY for the rich:Flight is for the rich, medicare is for the rich, fueling a car( not just owning a car) is for the rich, feeding ( whether 1or 4 or 5 square meals daily) is for the rich and now only the rich can make calls or be online. Even road transport is for the rich. It cost N70000 to return from IgboUkwu to Lagos in the first week of this year and that is who many of my compatriots are still at home, when the Christmas season has expired. As one jokist lamented, even the cost of ‘I love you’, which used to be ‘I love you too’ has been hiked to human hair, rent or iPhoneQ. Few are EXTREMELY rich, indulging in sinful opulence but most are EXTREMELY poor, barely able to keep body and soul together… and the gap is widening ferociously. We have become a nation of 200 millionaires and 200000 million beggars, both direct and indirect! And as Thomas Hardy( Mayor of Casterbridge), the master story-teller mournfully rued in 1880s, Nigeria has beccome a replica of Casterbridge of yore where for most people, happiness is but occasional episodes in the continuous drama of pain and deprivation
BusinessDay
has just reported that the prices of antibiotics have gone up by x11.
However,it is not just antibiotics! I should know because owing to unfavourable combination of ciscumstances,I am a very regular
and ‘popular’ at pharmacists’ and hospitals ( in
Lagos, Ijebuode and IgboUkwu) especially for the past 25 years. And you need to experience the hike in prices of
basic medications before you can meaningfullly appreciate the situation. One day, I met a man at a pharmacy shop who
declared that he would go and await blindness following an indescribable hike
in the price his regular eye ointments. Another day I met another who stormed
out of the pharmacist’s shop in protest
when a card of his regular BP medication cost more than what he used to buy the last parket! In
protest? Against whom? Do they know? Do they care? When they treat ordinary headache in France?
Nigerians
now eat from dustbins, in fulfilment of the
predictions of prophets of doom, who had predicted that it would be the norm one day. Who are those
prophets? Umaru Diko, Buhari and one
Usani_ Usani. In 2016, Buhari prophesied that Nigerians will soon start eating from the
dust bins. on 11/2/17,Usani U
Usani, Minister of Niger Delta urged us to be grateful to God that PMB took over because if not,
Nigerians would have been crawling to eat from the wastebins. On 10/8/18, PMB reminded us that things were
still good because Nigerians have not yet started eating from the
dustbins. But the original apostle of the Dustbin Hypotheses
was Umaru Dikko, a quintescence of everything that was wrong with the Shagari
regime, who argued that Nigerians were not that poor; they have not
started eating from dustbin. Some Nigerians are committing felo de se in desperation and
despondency. Felo de se? Suicide! We are now very close to
the level where people will be killing
and eating each others childdren as it happened in the
great Aramean siege on Samaria( 2nd kings 6, 20-29). That scenerio
is very close because people are
now selling some children so as to carter for the rest. Sad… but true.
Incidentally,
this is in a country where facts and
figures are bandied about as to how we saved N970bn
in lost revenue, $20bn from
subsidy removal and Naira floatation (with
N1.4trn from June to September 2024) and $7.5bn annually from subsidy removal. We also
raked in N50trn from crude oil
revenue and N6trn from Customs service in 2024. However, our
national debt has risen to N142.3trn as
at September, 2024. As Prof ROC Somoye asked in his inaugural lecture years
ago, where did the money go? It is not surprising then that Nigeria ranked 135th out of 199 countries latest Quality
of Living Index by Global Citizen Solutions, a ranking which considered
availability and cost of day-to-day amenities, such as infrastructure, cost of
living, personal and political freedom, environmental quality ; this comes on
the backdrop of the harsh economic condition in Nigeria and reflects the
current cost of living crisis in the country.
However, the most
painful aspect of this sordid scenario
is that while we were fasting, THEY were feasting and that was where the money
went! N21bn was spent to build the
VPs Abuja residence while N4bn was spent on Dodan Barracks and N3bn on
Aguda House. About N70bn was devoted to
SUVs at inflated prices for NASSists. N1.5bn was
spent on cars for the wife of the President who earlier told us that
they were so rich that they did not need our money. 300% salary increase was
approved for judicial staff( which was
speedily passed by the yes-sir
crowd in the NASS) while ASUU is still haggling over 2009 agreement;
duty tour allowance was hiked for public
officers, and just the other day, a government that had outlawed Dollarised pricing in Nigeria rolled
out a package for retiring Generals involving among others, $20000! Billions
were budgeted for the old-new presidential jet, yatch, the presidential jeep and tyres while
almost N100bn was spent on subsiding pilgrims. The President had been running
the country from abroad, visiting us occasionally while at times both himself
and his vice would be away, with the
global record of the highest contingents. Between
May ’23 to and October, ‘24: BAT and his vice undertook 41 foreign trips across 26
countries, spending 180 days off shore.
While we fasted, they
awarded the multi-trillion Lagos-Calabar highway, without budgeting, without
bidding and without any EIA. Of course, we have the largest cabinet in the
history of this nation and when the government restructured, it
sacked 5 Ministers and engaged 7!
The Bauchi State Government spent N6bn to renovate the Government House
which was renovated with N16bn in 2023 and N600m proposed for just 4 computers( even if it were
the type used in the pentagon)while Taraba State Governor spent N2.66bn on
furniture within 9 months while the deflated Imperial Speaker of Lagos State spent N17bn
on the Assembly gate and budged N30bn
for cars in 2023 and NO cars were purchased or maybe, he purchased ‘soft’
cars. And as the year ended, a presidential convoy of more than 50
invaded Lagos, causing unimaginable
go-slow for the CITIZENS, who are his
masters.
In Abuja, Wike has built
40 houses for judges (at about N30bn), proposed N10bn for rent and furniture
for 4 principal officers of NASS, which has its own block-budget, and for
whom a residential complex had gone beyond plastering and roofing. This is in a
situation where N11.5bn is allocated
for 20,000 renewed-hope houses for the masters. N22bn was also allotted for renovation ( not
construction of a new)of DSS quarters.
The statehouse has just budgeted N15bn
for cars, tyres and office
complex and N9.4bn for tours and meals, N27bn for the maintenance of former
heads of state and N55bn for the
maintenance of presidential fleet. The hardworking Minister of Darkness has
just proposed N8bn advocacy programme to encourage the payment of electricity
bills while promising us that the
national grid( powered by greed) will continue to collapse. Jamb had spent
almost N1bn on fumigation and more than N1bn on feeding and Yusuf Imam, the recently elected Chairman of Nasarawa LGA in Kano has appointed
60 aides, including 8 Director
Generals,18 special reporters and an
Executive Assistant on Tribes. ALL for just one Local Government. When LGs
start appointing Director Generals…. More than 10 Ministers and other members
of NASS invaded Ghana for the swearing in of their new president who scrapped 7
Ministers on his first day in office. He was so overwhelmed that he addressed
BAT as the president of Ghana!
On a personal level, Wike who had queried why people should send their children abroad to study Law, led a contingent of his boys to witness the graduation of his son from Queen Mary University London university with a postgraduate degree in Law. Sure, as e then sweet him, e dey pain us. This is when hike in school fees has sent many away from school At Eko Hotel, the rooms that cost N680000( Bed ONLY) were fully booked and just the other day, one of my compatriots generated billions in support for the mothers funeral and spent NIbn on casket, tent and related matters. Rather than deal with insecurity, they go for bulletproof cars and inprison themselves within self made prison in the form of gatted and high-walled apartments. And they always tell us that they are aware of our sufferings but whenever they want to alleviate it, we witnesst the most weird of tokenism as goats, sugger-cane, mats, ropes( yes; ropes) and shoe-shining kits are dished out before the global community! And even at the federal level, the reforms are often about whitewashing of existing structures, to create an impression.
Our people say that ‘aka aj’aja wetelu onu mmanu-mmanu’ (a soiled/sandy hand leads to an oily mouth), which is related to the Pauline injunction that those who do not work should not eat(1Thes,3:10). However, in Nigeria of today, many of those who do no real work are living epicuriously , mostly through the ‘come & chop model’ while those who work, work and work are fasting or rather starving. We have been endlessly urged to endure, tighten our belts, renew and reinvigorate our hope and that there is light at end of an obviously endless tunnel. However, this contrasts painfully with outrageously and unabashedly ostentatious living for the PEPs, their allies and a few private individuals. And they FLAUNT these ostentatiousness in our Very Before. May 2024 not repeat itself in 2025, though the signs are already afloat especially with food inflation at 40% We have also just received two beautiful new year gifts: hikes in telecom service charges and fuel prices. Maybe, the fasting will soon abate as the FG had decided to pay N75000 CASH to to 70million poorest of the poor in 2025 despite an audit report that previous efforts yoelded atrocious outcomes. By the way, N75000 will yield N206 daily; about 10% of the price of a reasonable loaf of bread. If the amount is per household…then… and that is if it gets to those targeted!
So? “The harsh realities of our country cannot
be sugar-coated. We live in a nation where the rich grow fatter on the sweat h of
the poor, where our youth struggle to find meaningful work, and where the value
of labour is often trampled underfoot.“A bag of 50kg rice sells for N105,000,
transport from Abuja to Port Harcourt is above N50,000, decent housing has
become a mirage, while basic healthcare is out of reach. Basic social services
are becoming elusive even as we have to struggle to get some governors to pay
us a paltry N70,000 National Minimum Wage—the product of a law passed by the
state- Joe Ajero, NLC
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