Nigerians Living In Muti-dimensional Poverty
Basic Facts
72% of Nigerians living in muti-dimensional poverty reside in rural areas, like, Tse-Ackaa Sakera Town in Mbamaar District of Logo Local Government Area of Benue State, North-Central Nigeria. Locate your own town in your mind and you will understand what rural area means in Nigeria.
That is where 72% of poor Nigerians live. This is basically within a Local govt Area. For my home town, it’s Local govt Area is Logo. Logo is in Benue State. So the responsibility to take the Tse-Ackaa Sakera Town folks out of poverty lies squarely under the Chairman and councillors of Logo LGA first. Then Benue State government. Not really the Federal government.
Sokoto State, the State that is called the seat of the caliphate has the highest number of poor people in Nigeria. It’s easy to know why. This award is followed by Bayelsa State, my second State.
This is ironic because Bayelsa is the smallest State in terms of Land and population in Nigeria. But God has compensated the State for this disadvantage by putting under its numerous creeks, the enormous amount of resources, the principal amongst which is crude Oil and Gas.
Other write-ups that might interest you:
- Benue State – Historical Background
- A Word To The Good People Of Sankera And Buruku
- Finest Girl In Nigeria International, Esther Adoo Gum
Bayelsa is the second-largest producer of Crude oil and the first-largest producer of gas in Nigeria. It receives 13% derivation proceeds from the federation account on top of Billions of normal monthly allocations. Governor Nyesom Wike recently revealed that trillions of Naira that were withheld for years since under President Obasanjo were released to all the oil-producing States, of which Bayelsa is a royal member.
There is also NNDC. So why should Bayelsa State, a State virtually created by Sanni Abacha through Late Chief Melford Obiene Okilo, who was a Minister under Abacha, be the state with the second largest poor people in Nigeria? I am sure you know the answer.
There are 200,000 networks of rural roads in Nigeria. This also includes the Ugba- Amatso-Asom-Tse-Ackaa-Agbungu-Afia Road. Arguably the oldest rural road in Benue State.
87% of all rural roads in Nigeria including this particular rural road are in very bad condition, completely impassable during the rainy season. So begin to imagine why poverty is not running away from Tse-Ackaa Sakera Town, just like thousands of other poverty-stricken towns across Nigeria.
Only 40%, that is 40,000 rural roads in Nigeria are manageable all year round.
According to the National Bureau Of statistics, 133 million Nigerians, representing 63% of the Nigerian Population are currently living in multi-dimensional poverty.
If these little facts do not make you realise that those who have been governing you from Councillor to the governor have failed you, and you must cast your vote and protect it, to make sure they don’t go back to milk you more, then you don’t know that you are a poor man. And so you will remain a poor man again from 2023-2027.
Will the world end, if your road, your school, your hospital, your market etc is done, the same way these European cities, they frequent and see are done?
That is if you do not die of poverty. And so continue to celebrate and adore those who have confined you to poverty since 1999. And I am sure you know them all. They were in 1999 as poor, if not poorer than you now. But can you see that they have taken themselves out of poverty by stealing from you, your children and children yet unborn?
The Billions they steal monthly since 1999 are what should have been used to take you out of poverty. While they ‘ travel abroad for medical check-ups even, the General Hospital in Ugba, as a case study, does not have drugs, no electricity, no water, no beds etc. That is the biggest medical facility in the entire Logo LGA. Ditto your own LGA.
Do you see their children in primary, and secondary schools and universities around you? No. Because they now look at you as a pest, a burden. So poverty is not a curse, it’s not from your village people, but it’s systemic from those you celebrate as your leaders. They created this unprecedented poverty that pervades every rural area across entire Nigeria.
Don’t let these thieves deceive you with the Ukrainian war, inflation, the American dollar, the Japanese yen and those flimsy excuses they give you, thinking you are a dummy and a nitwit not to know what the issues are.
Why have these reasons they give not stopped them from ‘ flying abroad for sundry meetings in European exotic tourist cities? Will the world end, if your road, your school, your hospital, your market etc is done, the same way these European cities, they frequent and see are done?
For further insight into the Implications of the Muti-dimensional poverty syndrome in rural Nigeria, read The Guardian, Thursday, December 1, 2022. Pages 1 & 6.
( C) Barr. Reubens Acka, The man who hates poverty.