Opinion: Poverty – A raging monster across the country

by Dele Fatokun

NIGERIA POVERTY

 Poverty in Nigeria appears to be self-inflicting and ridiculous, especially when observed that Nigeria is the world’s eighth largest oil producing country.

Years back, Nigeria was a haven of economic boom where the citizens were proud and prepared to sacrifice their personal conveniences to sustain the sovereignty of the country. Then, Naira exchange was as high as one naira to a dollar. Suddenly, what appears like spiritual conspiracy and mystical deluge ravaged the country. In a nutshell, things began to fall apart (in tandem with Chinua Achebe’s literature) until economic, moral, social life in Nigeria became grossly depleted. For instance, honesty, prudence, hard work and accountability collapsed like packs of cards and gave way to corruption that forcefully took over and has eaten deep into the fabric of the nation. Unfortunately, most Nigerian children, youths and adults: the educated and the illiterate, politicians and civil servants, all became birds of the same feather flying in the same direction with the singular purpose to strangulate the nation to economic dearth and poverty of mind, soul and spirit in the entire society.

Today, Nigeria holds world record in the number of children out of school culminating into one out of five Nigerian being out of school. Statistically, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization reported in June 10, 2013 that Nigeria ranked the highest of the nations of the world with the number of young people out of school accounting for 47 % of the global out – of- school population. Shockingly again, by 2012, 112 million Nigerians were reported to be living below poverty level (Premium Times) as confirmed by the National Bureau of Statistics. Further analysis by Richard Hamilton, BBC, Africa in 2010, revealed that the poverty ratings of some zones in Nigeria as follows: North-West 77.7%, North-East 76% and South-west 59.1%.

Poverty in Nigeria appears to be self-inflicting and ridiculous, especially when observed that Nigeria is the world’s eighth largest oil producing country.  Notwithstanding the enormous human and economic resources that are   endowments of the country, about 100 million of a total population of over 160 million, lived on less than a dollar a day and with 60.9 % living in abject poverty as a result of corruption with impunity. It is worthy of note that poverty in Nigeria has reached absolute level where the citizens are deprived of basic human needs:  water, sanitation, clothing, shelter, health care and education. A pertinent question now is, “who is to be blamed for all these endemic corruption and economic woes crippling Nigerians and had robbed many of their consciences? From the great to the small, the educated to the illiterates, the   poor to the rich of our nation could be held responsible for the current economic downturn in the country.

For example, a peasant woman selling tomatoes will pile up good products a few depths on top of her basket with more than three quarters of the basket laded with grasses underneath. A cashier in the bank can break the protocol of first come first serve to attend to a money-bag just for an overture; just as a petrol attendant will adjust the metre to surcharge the customers. The politician will baptize himself with fellow human’s blood to access the position of power. A law enforcement agent saddled with the responsibility of protecting the citizens will take life just for less than a dollar, a lawyer or an advocate will betray his dignity to defend a criminal just for money.  A bencher will pronounce ungodly judgment when money exchanges hands, a civil servant will amass the pensioners fund for a year jail or an option of payment of ridiculous amount as penalty, all in the guise that the law only acts on facts and not on moral principles.

The bottom line of all these predicaments is that the fear of God has departed from the society. Moral instructions, olden day discipline in schools, exemplary characters of the leaders have become things of the past. As the Holy Scripture has said woe is on the nation that forgets God. It is therefore, not surprising that our nation has nose-dived into a state of dilemma and is now wallowing in un-abating terrorism, long-term ethnic conflicts, political instability, indiscriminate bloodshed, and bulk passing that have assumed unpalatable crescendo in Nigeria.

Although, the condition appears to be growing worse every day, especially with the recent rumour that the nation’s economy is in the red. The poverty status of Nigeria can be reversed to prosperity, a haven of wealth if we (as individuals or as a nation) throw away greed, cheats, deceit, corruption and hold to the golden rule of do to others what you want them to do to you and the fear of God in all our dealings with fellow human beings. I am very optimistic that there is hope for this nation if we must but look inward to see where we have erred. Let us all retreat back to where we have missed the mark as a nation. Let us stop managing our lives outside God’s divine counsel and embrace dialogue with God.

Generally, man is a tripartite being comprising the body, soul and spirit. In the same vein, poverty is three dimensional: poverty of the body, poverty of the soul, and poverty of the spirit. Poverty of the spirit opens up opportunity for oppression by the devil, thereby ending up in wasted life. The only option therefore is to handle poverty of the spirit with all sense of urgency to avoid great loss to the flesh and eternal damnation in hell.

This write up therefore pleads with all and sundry who desire prosperity to seek the face of the Lord, repent of their sins and embrace God Almighty in holiness and righteousness. Delay is dangerous and tomorrow may be late. It is the will of God that poverty should be controlled in our land, but more than all, we must recognize our sinful disposition as a nation, stop killing innocent souls, while exposing corruption and turn to God for forgiveness. Be that as it may after solving the spiritual aspect, we need to embrace dignity of labour. Let the rich invest in agriculture and employ the restive youths, let there be vocational centers to train the school leavers for income generation.

 

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Read this article in the Leadership Newspapers

 

Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.

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