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Instead of jointly proffering workable solutions to the rising poverty rate in Nigeria, the Federal Government (FG) and the governors recently embarked on a blame game that is surprising and needless. While the FG blamed the high poverty level in Nigeria on state governors, the governors threw the blame back to the FG and accused it of not fulfilling its obligations to Nigerians.
On the side of the FG is the Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Mr. Clement Agba. According to him, the governors pay more attention to building flyovers and airports in the cities instead of improving the life of the 72 per cent of the nation’s poor who reside in the rural areas. “Rather than governors continuing to compete to take loans to build airports that are not necessary, where they have other airports so close to them, or governors now competing to build flyovers all over the place, we appeal that they should concentrate on building rural roads so that the farmers can at least get their products to the market,” Agba admonished.
President Muhammadu Buhari even added his voice to the blame game and traced the rising poverty to the mismanagement of the local government funds and 13 per cent derivation to oil producing states.
The governors, under the aegis of the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF), accused the FG of being responsible for the poverty rate. In a statement, the governors said Agba’s accusation was diversionary, unnecessary and a brazen descent into selective amnesia. The governors reminded the FG that the primary duty of any government is to ensure the security of life and property. “But the Federal Government, which is responsible for the security of life and property has been unable to fulfill this covenant with the people; thus allowing bandits, insurgents, and kidnappers to turn the country into a killing field, maiming and abducting people, in schools market squares and even on their farmlands.” All these have made life for the rural people harsh and brutish, leading, invariably, to poverty.
In 2018, when the World Poverty Clock adjudged Nigeria as the poverty capital of the world, the country had 86.9 million people living in extreme poverty. Today, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), we have about 133 million Nigerians living below poverty level. This has surpassed the World Bank’s prediction that 15 to 20 million more Nigerians might join the poverty rank in 2022. What this means is that it will be difficult for the country to meet the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) to end extreme poverty by 2030. This is frightening and a ticking time bomb.
Already, Nigeria is among the top 10 hunger-ravaged countries in the world. The United Nations, recently, estimated that about 4.1 million people in the North-East, for instance, are at the severe risk of food insecurity and starvation. The situation is worsened by the high rate of unemployment, which has left a great number of youths despondent and angry. Unfortunately, many companies which could have employed these youths have shut down.
The FG should take the greater part of the blame for this situation because it collects more money than the states. Though it had embarked on a number of poverty alleviation programmes such as N50,000 Payroll Support for three months to over 300,000 beneficiaries and one-time grants of N30,000 to about 100,000 artisans, how have these programmes impacted on the real poor people?
These are mere palliative measures which have not fundamentally reduced any poverty rate. President Buhari had promised to pull 100 million Nigerians out of poverty by 2030. Rather than improve, the poverty rate has worsened. This shows that whatever measure the government has adopted is not working.
The way the states have emasculated the local governments also contributes to the high poverty rate. The local governments are almost non-existent. What many state governments have done is to use the LG funds as conduit pipes through which they siphon money which they deploy to causes other than alleviating the plight of the rural people. They engage in unnecessary profligacy and swim in corruption and are not bothered about what happens to their citizens.
There is need to have local government autonomy. It is the government that is closest to the people. They need to have their own separate accounts. This will empower them to face the problems within the local communities squarely. We believe it will go a long way in tackling poverty in the country.
We must be careful not to unwittingly invite the poverty-induced Arab Spring type of revolution, which started in Tunisia in December 2010, into the country. Nigerians no longer have time for any needless exercise in buck passing. They are more interested in having their problems solved. Governments at all levels must make efforts to take people out of poverty by doing what they were elected to do. The FG, in particular, should effectively manage monetary policies in such a way as to stabilise the prices of essential goods and services and create employment. The two tiers of government should also invest in education, health care and technology.
