Nigeria – where are the safety nets?

The Nigerian economy is in a free fall. It has not just happened. It is a process that was slow in coming, but surely, it was coming. The weak tendons of a mono base that apparently held it firmly were a flourishing oil market and price, and a political leadership that was profligate.  In such […]

The Nigerian economy is in a free fall. It has not just happened. It is a process that was slow in coming, but surely, it was coming. The weak tendons of a mono base that apparently held it firmly were a flourishing oil market and price, and a political leadership that was profligate.  In such burning of a candle at both ends, matters were bound to give, and they did. We told ourselves lies that we were rich and comfortable, and in the day dreaming, lived above our means till the end. We then further engaged in panic looting of the treasury till this checkmate.
In a free fall, objects, in this case, including human beings and their fortunes fly and tumble to the ground, passionately wailing in wish that they had some social parachute. A parachute does not stop the fall. It reduces the velocity, assuring a softer landing, and enabling the falling object, animate or inanimate, to cope with landing in safety. Governments expectedly apply management techniques to offer parachutes and configure the nation to a safe landing. Sadly in our situation, the dam has burst. Every effort is nimble – a finger in the dyke. Today, realities spell higher living costs in all ramifications. The ordinary citizens of Nigeria that shouted CHANGE loudest, are in despair, falling down the economic abyss without a parachute, unable to understand how things have changed so dramatically for the worse. So far, there has not been a promise to hold on to other than the dreadful admonition to face the reality that bad times have descended upon the nation. The 2016 Budget was slow in coming, when it came, it was "stolen" and when it reappeared, it was found "padded". Both scenarios had never been heard of in Nigerian Budget history. All this implies that as the free fall continues, the nation is losing time to reconfigure the national flight from a crash to a safe landing.
The English expression of being up the river in a cement boat and without a paddle is apt. We are tumbling down, without parachutes, and worse, we look down below, and there are no safety nets, specifically targeted at the poor and vulnerable, who bear the brunt of the vagaries of the economic down turn. Endless hours in long queues at petrol fill up stations nationwide that only grow longer, endless hours at the ATM in long queues that only grow longer, and as if this is not after a long wait for that salary alert that in some months does not come! In the same way as the nation operates a mono based economy, the global income is salary based, taking nearly 80% of the statutory allocation to states. The extended family system ensures dependents remain supported.
It is for this reason that I bemoan the reversal of the policy to pay a stipend of N5000 to the poor and vulnerable who have no answer to the challenge of living, let alone the effects of an economy in a nose-dive. The decision to abandon the promise was not an informed decision, and it pained to hear Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State, decry the safety net on the grounds that it would make the ordinary citizen take more wives and bear more children, whereas it was he during campaigns that made donations of cash and valuables of more than N5000 to the poor and needy continuously. Was it only for the glare of our TV screens?
If time is spent to develop the template, social security for the poor and vulnerable through a stipend of N5000 is feasible even in our dire times. Studies exist that buttress this feasibility. A template worked successfully in Jigawa paying N7000 as stipends to the extremely poor and vulnerable. A social security law needs to be put in place compelling governments at all levels to specific action. The Federal Government needs to drive this, but fanning out responsibilities to the States to address their peculiar circumstances. Ideally, the vulnerable should be identified as the physically challenged, the destitute elderly with no visible family care, at which level, it is known that palliatives are for the term of natural life. Other vulnerable groups include those members of society who the cocktail of ignorance and poverty has robbed of their self-esteem. These require a rehabilitation process that balances their livelihood first, leads them to basic skills and eventual release to self-sustenance. It is unfortunate that after so much hype and hope, this idea was jettisoned entirely in self-defeat. This would have been the change the masses craved for.
The renege on the promised N5000 has cast doubts on the sincerity of the Government with the N500bn safety net for poverty alleviation and reduction. Society views the promise against past failed attempts through NAPEP, SURE-P, and YOU-WIN, all of them safety net programs that held promise but were derailed for lack of commitment and follow through. Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has continuously reiterated six protection programs that include ‘Teach Nigeria’ where 500,000 unemployed graduates to be hired and trained as teachers, Youth Employment and Empowerment for 300,000 and 500,000 youths engaged in skills acquisition and vocational training; the now jettisoned Conditional Cash Transfer, for extremely poor Nigerians to receive N5000 monthly this year. But these promises are mere discordant music in the ears of common folk striving to eke out a living in an economy that has thrown everything haywire, as is tumbling down. Needed now is more than assurance and a promise. Action now.