ECONOMIC HARDSHIP: TINUBU'S FRANKNESS AND EMPATHY AMIDST GOVERNORS' LANGOROUS ALOOFNESS | SOUTHWEST FIRST ALERT MAGAZINE
"Poverty is not a shameful thing, but not acceptable. We must banish it! But let's interrogate. How did we get here?... Can we continue to service external debt with over 90% of our revenue? It is a path to destruction. We can not continue that. We have to make HARD DECISIONS....If we must achieve greatness as a nation, what do we do except take bold decisions. It could be painful at the beginning. In the medium term and long run, it is not about you. It is not about me. It is about generations yet unborn." - President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR
Above were the words of Nigeria's numero uno, His Excellency Bola Ahmed Tinubu during his engagement with the business community not too long ago. From his submissions above, I could deduce four (4) key words, which are;
● Poverty
● Banishment
● Interrogation
● Hard decisions
A popular Yorùbá cliché says, 'Amúnkùn-ún ẹrù ẹ wọ́. Ó ní òkè lẹ̀ n wò. Ẹ ò wo ìsàlẹ̀' which in this context literally means, we as a people must act in retrospection. Many, if not all of us - Nigerians, albeit idiosyncratic of our character, think of the present without a glimpse into the past. We all make it look like Nigeria was working yesterday. Tinubu's government only came to wreck untold havoc. Can we all for once self-ruminate individually? Can we look into the mirror and examen ourselves? Did we get here by accident? Did President Bola Tinubu abdicate his responsibility when he recognised the excruciating poverty in the land? Did he blame his predecessor, or did he submit that the situation was that of a vicarious liability where everyone was culpable? Let me elucidate further on those four (4) profound words/phrase, that I consider, in my view, to be very germane from Mr. President’s submission.
POVERTY
Is there poverty in the land? Yes! There is preponderance of it as it is ubiquitous. Did Mr. President deny the ravaging effect of poverty in the land? Of course, President Tinubu did not play down poverty and its existential threat to the citizens of the country. He actually empathised and emphatically stated that it was (and is) not acceptable because of the abundant wealth the country is endowed with.
BANISHMENT
It is in recognition of the threat poverty poses to the Nigerian people that Mr. President advocated for its banishment. Mr. President’s body language and actions have both shown he is not given to rhetorics. He wants to change the cause of Nigeria for good. He wants to leave behind, a legacy of shared prosperity and historic landmarks. People must be open to his sincerity of purpose.
INTERROGATION
The best way to solve a problem is to first find out the root cause of such. Hence, the statement by Mr. President to interrogate why we are where we are today. A man who's treating sexually transmitted infections knows exactly the root cause of his quandaries. In my assessment, I found out few of the reasons why our country is faced with unparalleled poverty. And these include but not limited to;
➡️Infrastructural decay, especially absence of stable power.
➡️Monolithic economy where Nigeria depends solely on oil for revenue.
➡️Weak currency leading to high inflationary rate
➡️Collapse of country's refineries that hitherto saw economic predators cum 'bandits' from among the military, political and business class subject the country and her entire citizenry to continuous agony of fuel importation.
HARD DECISIONS
The truth that many loathe to hear is that the country's economy was in doldrums as of May 29, 2023. No matter how some persons might look at it, Nigeria's economy was comatose. The country was servicing its near N77trillion debt with over 80% of its earnings. The Debt Management Office (DMO) actually confirmed this statistics. It got worse that even some of the country's crude oil that were yet to be produced as of 2023 had already been pledged to pay off some debts. It's that bad. The Tinubu administration inherited an economy that's practically calamitous! It does not matter if some persons hate this truth.
The only option, therefore, left for the new administration in order to prevent the country from going the way of Greece and Venezuela was to think outside the box and find a way around reflating the economy. Bold decisions that came with interim pains had to be made. Reforms that came with some discomforts were introduced, but not without empathy from Mr. President.
THE EMPATHY
President Tinubu knew some of his planned reforms would come with teething pains. What did he do? He came up with some interim measures to cushion the effects of such. Part of such measures were;
● Provision of palliatives to sub-nationals to help ordinary Nigerians in their respective states.
● Provision of N35,000 monthly Wage Allowance to Federal civil servants.
● Release of food items from the country's national reserve to help vulnerable families among other measures.
GOVERNORS' LANGOROUS ALOOFNESS
The mentality of the majority, including those who are educated, in Nigeria today is that the country runs a unitary system of government. Everybody looks up to the Federal Government while speaking less of the sub-nationals that make up the country. The average Nigerian is not bothered about how their state governors run the affairs in their states, but would want to blame the Federal Government for everything. We, as a people, have turned the state governors to mini-gods that are untouchable. The Federal Government must bare all the blame. The Governors today display not only indifference to people's sufferings, they seem to 'terrorrise' anyone who dares challenge their authority.
In the wake of the current economic hardship, state governors across the Federation were given a minimum of N2bn each by the Tinubu administration as palliative measure to cushion the effect of the situation. Many governors, till date, have not done anything, including my own state honcho, Gov Ademola Jackson Adeleke, who is only notorious for his dancing prowess. Ask Governor Ijólarí what he did for Osun State indigenes with the money he received. He can not point to anything meaningful.
The increased monthly allocation from the Federation Account to state governors have only helped many of them to up their ostentatious lifestyles. Many of the State Governments are getting almost double of their previous allocations. Some getting almost triple. But ask them to show you workings of such increase in their stewardship. Only a minuscule, may be Lagos, Borno, Anambra, and Kaduna can be seen to have done and still doing something. Others are busy with Local Government Councils allocations from the Federation Account to add to their buffers.
Until Nigerians wake up from their deep slumbers to hold their state emperors accountable to the people, we may all, as a people, have to keep the rigmarole.
Hold your governors accountable! Ẹ jẹ́ kí á fi ẹ̀tẹ̀ sílẹ̀. Kí á yé é pa làpálàpá.
OMOGBOLAHAN L.A. BABAWALE
Public Affairs Analyst
Convener/Lead Resource Person
The Think-Tinubu Initiative (3TI)
officialczar2@gmail.com/riches.babs@gmail.com
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