Between obscene largesse and obscene poverty

Monday 31st of July 2023 typically ought to be a busy working day.

But what dominates the day is the obscenely expanding frontiers of poverty and hunger that got escalated on May 29th 2023 when a new government led by Mr. Ahmed Bola Tinubu arrived.

And in what may be seen and appropriately interpreted as an unfriendly arrival, President Tinubu immediately unleashed a staccato of upward reviews of the pump price of petrol and in less than a month, pump price of fuel has ramped up to the obscenely cost of N617 Per litre from N150 that it was just before the new administration was inaugurated on May 29th.

The pump price reviews of petrol were attributed to the withdrawal of subsidy according to Tinubu was amongst others, has to be effected because some known crooks were smuggling Nigerian domestic subsidised fuel to neighbouring nations and selling at the external Countries’ pump price which is far higher than what the subsidised fuel in Nigeria costs.

This reason is illogical and at best is a fallacy of disjointed reasoning because what government has done is to stop the subsidy because of the activities of the criminals thereby inflicting economic pains on the innocent masses but allowing those criminals to go with their profits they made from smuggling fuel hitherto subsidised for the Nigerian market.

The decision of government amounts to killing a housefly with a sledge hammer. The outcome of the thoughtless economic policy of the government which includes allowing market forces determine the value of Naira, is the spread of obscene poverty amongst millions of Nigerians. Aside the fuel smuggling gangsters that they government blamed for making fuel subsidy unaffordable but who have been allowed to go with their stolen assets off the back of the funds originally intended to subsidise fuel for the masses of Nigeria, are other sets of government approved looters working within the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited who allegedly siphoned billions of dollars in the name of fixing the local refineries which were never done for many years since 2015 to 2023.

The evidence of the above theft of public fund can be deduced from the press statement of the governor of Nasarawa State, Mr. Abdullahi Sule, quoted in the media on the eve of the inauguration of the current administration that the Muhammadu Buhari administration expended over $19 billion on repairing Nigeria’s four refineries in eight years without commensurate results.

Speaking on Channels Television, the governor, who was Managing Director of African Petroleum (AP) about two decades ago, stated that the process of fixing the country’s refineries was largely mismanaged.

Nigeria’s ailing refineries were built in the 60s, 70s and 80s, but have since gulped billions of dollars in Turnaround Maintenance (TAM), with the expected outcomes mostly disappointing. However, Sule’s assertion that over $19 billion was spent by the former president could not be independently verified, according to the medium that reported the story.

The Nasarawa staye governor Mr. Sule, also explained that he had always supported the removal of subsidy because he believed that there was massive fraud in the process. He recalled that as Managing Director of AP, he had complained over 22 years ago that there was no way Nigeria would consume 30 million litres of petrol per day at the time. This governor made the same error of thinking by blaming criminals for the decision to withdraw the petrol subsidy.

However, these elite bavking the withdrawal of fuel subsidy are insensitive to the immediate but concrete evidence of the obscene nature of poverty that resulted therefrom just as millions of Nigerians now wallow in poverty as it were and those who do not wish to die starving have started adopting self help measures.

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This is because at the weekend preceding this Monday, Adamawa State government had to impose 24- hours curfew to stop the looting of food warehouses belonging to the Federal government and have reportedly broken into Private food stores to steal foodstuffs.

Also on Monday, the workers of Oyo State had reportedly protested in Ibadan and are demanding palliative measures to cushion the negative economic impacts of the uncontrollable upward reviews of pump price of petrol by the central government through the NNPC Limited.

On Monday also, came a devastating report that thousands of Nigerians who were attempting to run away from the biting poverty in Nigeria have died in the Mediterranean deserts.

International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said at least 1,200 Nigerians have died while trying to migrate through the Sahara desert and Mediterranean Sea this year.

The acting Deputy Comptroller General of the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), Kemi Nandap, disclosed this Thursday during the 2023 Anti-Smuggling of Migrants Nationwide Sensitization and Enlightenment Campaign at the NIS headquarters in Abuja.

The event was held in commemoration of the 60th anniversary of the NIS.

Nandap, who is in charge of the Directorate of Migration, lamented that many Nigerian youths were losing their lives while trying to seek greener pastures abroad through irregular routes.

“We have a big problem in this country and that is the issue of ‘Japa syndrome’. We have so many of our youths who are dying in the Sahara, dying in the Mediterranean Sea. They are dying for no cause,” she said.

Nandap urged Nigerians wishing to ‘Japa’ to reach out to the migration desk in all the NIS state commands for necessary information.

Sadly, it is on top of the spread of obscene poverty amongst millions of Nigerians, that President Tinubu allocated N70 billion to the National Assembly and N30 billion to the judiciary staff and both institutions namely the National Assembly and the Judiciary do not have staff strengh of more than five thousand Nigerians.

But the government gave such obscene largesse to them whereas just the paltry eight thousand Naira for just 12 million poor Nigerian for six months, is being contemplated.

You must have read that Nigeria has 130 million multidimensional poor citizens. But only 12 million are captured on paper to benefit from the poorly packaged palliative measures of Tinubu. And this is where any rational being will wonder the sense in allocating so much money to so few Nigerians only because they are Legislators or judges.

And to think that this is a parliament that The Economist once described its lawmakers as the most paid in the world, when the UK newspaper reviewed the remunerations of lawmakers across 29 countries, it becomes even more pathetic.

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An online newspaper in Nigeria did an editorial condemning this obscene largesse and reminded us that the Economist had put a Nigerian lawmaker’s obnoxious earning at $189,500 per annum, as against $105,400 for his counterpart in the UK.

ALSO READ: Nigerian Economy: The Ripples and Pains of Removed Fuel Subsidy  

The online newspaper then stated that it did not matter then to the institution and the lawmakers that it was an embarrassment, given that Nigeria’s economy was not reckoned with globally, and it is still not so, for it to then have to deal with such obscenity.

The newspaper said also that “If the lawmakers can gauge the public mood properly, the best they should do is to cut the salaries and allowances of members as part of their own sacrifices, against the backdrop of belt-tightening that the masses are currently subjected to. Flowing from this, the predilection for public office holders to make themselves fat cats at public expense, as the federal lawmakers’ actions evince, should be resisted.” And Fela said “if a Cat is on its own and a Rat came and bite it on the tail, then the Rat is looking for trouble which the Cat will give it in plentiful quantity.”

On July 17th 2023, Sun Newspapers reported thus: “Twenty four hours after The Sun exclusively reported plans by the two chambers of the National Assembly- the Senate and the House of Representatives to spend N40 billion on Sports Utility Vehicles (SUVs) for members, new facts have emerged.”The Sun in the report had revealed plans to purchase 107 2023 model of Toyota Land Cruiser for senators and 2023 Toyota Prado for members of the House of Representatives.

The planned purchase, it was further reported, would be different from the official vehicles expected to be procured for the four presiding officers of the National Assembly, namely Senate President, Godswill Akpabio; Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tajudeen Abass and Deputy Senate President, Jibrin Barau; and Deputy Speaker, Benjamin Kalu.

Some senators who spoke to Daily Sun distanced themselves from the plans and called on the leadership of both chambers to settle for locally-assembled vehicles to reduce cost and recycle the funds in Nigeria. He said since the revelation became public they had been inundated with phone calls by their constituents and called on the leadership of the National Assembly to allow lawmakers decide on the best option to settle for.

One of the senators from the South East said it would be inhuman for him to drive an SUV of over N100 million when there were indigenous companies that assemble vehicles in Nigeria. He listed Innoson Motors, Kia Motors, Hyundai, among others.

He said though they had been informed, he said the issue would be taken up again with the Senate Committee on Services to express their misgivings about the plans.

Another lawmaker, who reached out to Daily Sun, following the publication of the story, urged the National Assembly to halt the plan for now and allow for more consultations. He also urged the leadership of both chambers to pass resolutions and bar appointees of government at the federal level from purchasing vehicles for official use not produced or assembled in Nigeria. He said if this initiative is pushed through, big car producing companies may open plans in Nigeria and created jobs for unemployed youths.

Reacting, National Coordinator of Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), Emmanuel Onwubiko, has described the plans as irresponsible.

He said: “This is simply ostentatious and absolutely irresponsible for the National Assembly to deploy such humongous fund to procure vehicles and they will probably be expending these huge cash to buy vehicles that are assembled outside of Nigeria thereby denying the competent Nigerian based vehicle’s manufacturing firms such as Innoson the benefit of generating revenues to continuously put Nigeria on the world’s map as a manufacturer of vehicles.

“To begin with, what happened to the exotic cars procured by the immediate past hierarchy of the National Assembly and why does it have to be new sets of highly exorbitant vehicles that have to be purchased every time there are new sets of legislators as if the National Assembly ought to have assets such as serviceable cars that successive heads and law makers should seamlessly inherit from their predecessors.

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“This decision is without any economic sense, it is mindless misappropriation of public funds to power the ostentatious lifestyles of a few at heavy costs to the public treasury. This should be resisted by all Nigerians of good conscience.”

Human rights lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Femi Falana, lashed the lawmakers for allocating N110 billion as palliative for themselves.

In a statement, he described their action as illegal, contemptuous and outrageous, pointing out that it was a blatant breach of the relevant provisions of the Nigerian Constitution. He called for the immediate reversal of the decision which he described as the “controversial allowances and the purchase of luxury vehicles.”

Falana accused the Assembly members of conspiring against the nation’s constitution out of sheer insensitivity coupled with impunity.

“Out of sheer insensitivity coupled with impunity, the members of the National Assembly, regardless of political affiliation, conspired to breach the relevant provisions of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 by padding the Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2023 to provide the so called palliative of N70 billion for 306 newly elected members.”

Falana reminded Nigerians that the judiciary had already ruled against such excessive allowances to lawmakers. He said the Federal High Court had declared that the National Assembly Service Commission has no authority to determine the remuneration and allowances of its members.

“The callous and insensitive decisions of the members of the National Assembly constitute a flagrant contravention of Section 70 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 as amended.”

ALSO READ: Subsidy Removal: Which should go first?

The fact is that public angst has reached a boiling point which calls for the most extreme measures to be put in place to assuage the situation.

As I was writing, story broke that President Tinubu will be making a public broadcast to Nigerians by 7pm.

It is expected that he will repeat his often quoted story line of asking Nigerians to exercise patience.

The point is that whereas Tinubu asks us to exercise patience, the political elite including the National Assembly members who were recently captured on television passing a resolution on the poor and making jest of poor Nigerians, but these persons are living in obscene opulence.

The President still goes about with many vehicles on his convoy just like the governors and other public office holders including the leadership of the legislature.

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The president is asking the dying masses to exercise patience whereas those who blew away billions of dollars of public fund meant to fix the local refineries have been left alone to enjoy their loots. To even hear the NNPCL officials who blew away our patrimony in the name of doing turn around maintenance, argue for fuel subsidy withdrawal, it then dawn on most Nigerians that this policy and other related policies churned out by Tinubu are not altruistic but self serving. Politicians who swim in opulence off the public funds should cover their faces in shame that thousands of Nigerians are dying from starvation and economic deprivation due to the thoughtless policies of the Tinubu’s administration. Urgent steps must be adopted. There is no harm in reworking the fuel subsidy initiative to turn it into fuel vouchers to be shared directly to poor Nigerians which they can even use as payments for transportation. This way, those so-called criminals diverting subsidised fuel to neighbouring nations will be chased away for good.

Fuel subsidy for Nigerians who truly need it is not a crime because aside it, government is not known to be subsidising any services to Nigerians. Nigerian poor don’t enjoy health insurance unlike the British citizens.

Even in the Western economies, the poor and unemployed are paid survival wages and babies born by British mothers are paid weekly allowances. In the USA, farmers collect subsidy from their government.

*EMMANUEL ONWUBIKO is head of the HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA and was NATIONAL COMMISSIONER OF THE NATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSION OF NIGERIA.