A nation and its many faces of destitution

November 28, 2013 by Samuel Awoyinfa

Several indices justify the World Bank’s recent claim that 100 million Nigerians live in destitution, SAMUEL AWOYINFA writes

A graduate, Kolade Ijiwunmi, completed his first degree in 2008. He did his one year national youth service in a private company in Yaba, Lagos. But Ijiwunmi is not as lucky as a few of his colleagues. He was not retained after the service. Thus, his search for an employment began.

After almost two years search for employment without any headway, both in public and private sectors, he began to think of other ways to get engaged. Ijiwunmi is now a popular face at building construction sites.

He works as a site labourer, joining others to carry moulded blocks, sand and granites for construction. He has done this for almost two years and he says his earnings still cannot afford him enough to get married or get a decent accommodation.

“It is not everyday people build houses,” the young man who earns an average of N1,500 daily says in impeccable English. “So, even after two years of doing this job, I still cannot afford to get married. I am only able to get a room for myself at Ikotun. I have no decent furniture, and other comfort of life.”

Ijiwunmi is not alone in this destitute net. He is one of those 100 million Nigerians the World Bank says live in destitution.

The World Bank Country Director for Nigeria, Marie Francoise Marie-Nelly, said this at the bank’s Country Programme Portfolio Review in Enugu on Tuesday, November 12, 2013.

She says, “1.2 billion people live in destitution out of which 100 million are Nigerians. Inequality is rising in many developing nations. For this reason, the World Bank’s corporate perspective has shifted more strategically in the past year. The bank wants to galvanise international and national support around two goals: to end extreme poverty in a generation and to push for greater equality.”

Over 40 million people are jobless

Unemployment level in the country has reached an all-time high. Every year, tertiary institutions churn out about 300,000 graduates.

In 2011, the National Bureau of Statistics indicated that 23.9 per cent of Nigerians are unemployed, meaning that about 40 million Nigerians needed employment. But the figure at present, informal sources say, is well over that, with youths forming the largest percentage.

Although the Federal Government, which consistently says the economy is improving, did not swiftly react to the World Bank’s claim, the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had in July noted that the spate of unemployment in the country is giving her sleepless nights. Quoting the National Bureau of Statistics, the minister declares, “Each year, about 1.8m young Nigerians enter our labour market, we need to ensure that the economy provides jobs for them.”

But many may describe this as lip service, since there is no evidence that new jobs are being radically created. That is why whenever  there are any openings, the employers are bombarded by a multitude of job seekers. Last year, the Independent National Electoral Commission had placed advertisements in the newspapers for vacancies for various positions. Only 1,500 job slots were available.  But 800,000 people applied for the jobs. Among them were some Ph.D holders struggling to fill  positions meant for first degree holders. Indeed, the vacancy advertisements placed in the newspapers on November 19, 2012 had invited applications for the positions of legal officers, system analysts, architects, engineers, estate officers and registration area officers on grade levels 07, 08 and 09.

To show the ‘destitution’ that now seldom romances the revered degree called Ph.D, earlier that month, Dangote Transport Company, which specialises in training and employing drivers after graduation, initiated a project called ‘The Drivers Academy”. It aims at recruiting and training 2,000 Nigerian graduates to become professional heavy vehicle drivers for the newly established super fleet of the group.

Surprisingly, of the 13,000 applications received, six have Ph.D, 704 were master’s holders, while 8,460 were bachelor degree holders. The Chairman of the company, Aliko Dangote,  revealed this while speaking during the mentorship meeting of the World Bank Youth Forum.

However, many Nigerians keep wondering why agencies such as the National Directorate of Employment are still existing.

Despite Nigeria’s agricultural resources and oil wealth, poverty is widespread in the land.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics,  about 61 per cent of Nigerians live on less than $1 a day (N160). And some state governments have yet to comply with the N18,000 minimum wage, which further compounds  poverty in the land.

Schooling with tears

The rot in all levels of education sector has continued to baffle many stakeholders.

Subsequent regimes and administrations have not given education due attention. It has been a Herculean task to devote 26 per cent of the annual budget to education, as recommended by the United Nation Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation.

From Kano, Abeokuta, Calabar, Lagos to Kaura Namoda, the situation is the same. Many public schools are reeling under dilapidated infrastructure, lack of equipment, and unqualified teachers, among other challenges.

In Unity Schools, which are supposed to be models for standards, things are so bad nowadays that parents are prevented from gaining access to their children’s hostels in many cases. This, of course, is for obvious reasons  – they harbour old and worn out mattresses, dismembered cupboards, and other facilities that are eyesore.

Many state and local government-owned schools are even worse off.  They lack sufficient chairs and desks, they use archaic blackboards, just as they are saddled with unmotivated teachers.

Of the 102 secondary schools recently selected for evaluation,  using the Quality Assurance Instrument for Basic and Secondary Education in Nigeria, only six are rated good, 28 fair; 65 poor; while three are rated very poor.

Further evaluation of the schools  in leadership and management indicates that none of the schools is outstanding. While 13 are rated good, 51 are adjudged fair and 37 others very poor.

The tertiary institutions are not better either. The neglect of the sector has resulted in the ongoing strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities. The action has entered its fifth month.  The situation has become so worrisome that foreign institutions, including those in Ghana and Republic of Benin are now havens for Nigerian students seeking better education.

A report says Nigerians annually pay close to N100bn to access education in Ghana.

ASUU National Treasurer, Dr. Ademola Aremu,  assessing the rot in the system, said,

“We cannot continue to churn out poorly educated graduates. We cannot condone the lip service being paid to education by the Nigerian government, the majority of who train their children in foreign universities. We are calling on Nigerians to rise up and challenge the Federal Government to prioritise education and develop the country. The Asian Tigers developed because of education. Students, parents, and well meaning Nigerians must rise up and tell the government that enough is enough.”

Health and lacklustre performance

The health of many Nigerians has suffered greatly, and quality of life of many is quite abysmal.  While primary health facilities have practically collapsed, patients have had to wait for more than four years to access major surgeries in public hospitals due to lack of facilities and shortage of doctors.

Only a few – top government officials especially – can afford to fly themselves or their loved ones out for treatment in Europe,  America, Asia – or even some neighbouring African countries.

It is also quite  sad that only 5.5 million out of 160 million  Nigerians  are covered under the National Health Insurance Scheme  of the country.

Stakeholders opine that this lacklustre attitude of government towards the sector is a major factor why Nigeria records one of the worst health indices in Africa and indeed the world .

According to the 2012 United Nations Aids report released in June, Nigeria has the highest population of babies born with HIV/AIDS and is among the top four countries with the highest rate of infections.

The country has also retained the shameful position as the only country in Africa that has yet to eradicate polio. Even war- torn countries like Liberia, Somalia and Mali have successfully banished polio infections from their population.

Nigeria is the second country in the world, after India, where pregnant women and children under the age of five die most. In a recent survey by the World Health Organisation, which involved over 178 countries, Nigeria ranked almost at the bottom of the last five countries with the worst health care systems.

While other countries are doing all they can to retain and satisfy their medical professionals, Nigeria keeps frustrating hers out of the country to India, Israel and even Sudan,  where good packages await them.

Hospitals are repeatedly shut down and critically-ill patients are turned back even in cases of emergencies due to frequent strike embarked upon by health workers. More than 90 per cent of Nigerians still pay out of pocket for their health care, that means that good care is only available for the rich.

The welfare of Nigerians seems to be the last thing on government’s agenda.

Roads of agony

According to statistics by the Rural Road Access and Mobility Project,  85 per cent of Nigerian roads  are in a state of disrepair. The statistics shows that only slightly above 16,000 sq.km of secondary and tertiary roads in the country are motorable .

While the Trunk A roads like the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, Benin-Ore Expressway, Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway, Okene-Abuja Road, among others, are largely in a state of disrepair, the intra-roads are not faring better.

Though contracts for the rehabilitation/reconstruction of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway have been awarded to two contractors, Julius Berger Plc and RCC Nigeria Limited, no substantial progress has been made. They are mainly carrying out palliative works.

Motorists are routinely held up in gridlock on that road, due to its bad condition. Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway is fast competing with the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway in the number of potholes and craters it harbours.

Travellers spend hours on Benin-Ore Expressway, due to its failed portions.  Between 1999 and 2007, over N300bn is said to have been spent on road repair across the country, but there is not much to show for it.

For intra-roads, many states score below average in this regard.  Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Anambra, Imo, Kogi, Kwara, Ebonyi, and Kano, among others, are in deficient in care for  their intra-roads. For instance, in Lambe, Ibafo and Mowe communities, residents still travel through muddy roads and uncharted forests to reach their homes. The same thing for residents of Itele, Lafenwa, Ikogbe, Ijagba, Iju, Lusada and Atan among others.

In Lagos, too, residents of Alimosho Local Government, which comprises Ipaja, Ayobo, Meiran, Ijegun, Egbeda, Idimu, and Ikotun, among others, still wade through some unpaved roads to their homes. When it rains, the roads become almost impassable. They become muddy and slippery. But this is what people wade through, often trudging in the mud or dust like pigs.

Suspended hope for electricity

The power sector remains one of the most frustrating areas in the country. It has attracted much interest due to its strategic nature.  It is one sector that has gulped billions of dollars, without commensurate electricity supply for the citizenry.  As a result, it is a norm in Nigeria to live in the dark.

Perhaps, it is only in Nigeria where up to six families will be living in a house and all of them have generators which they engage at the same time, with all attendant pollutant effects.

Like primitive folks, people are still experiencing darkness more than light, even while the FG has handed over power generation and distribution in its privatisation scheme to private investors. All the people can muster now is hope, despite the fact that a lot has been expended on the exercise.

Between 1999 and 2007, under the former President Olusegun Obasanjo administration,  a whopping $16bn was reportedly spent on the sector. The probe panel set up by the House of Representatives to investigate the projects awarded under the National Independent Power Projects was startled by earth-shaking revelations – on how some contractors got mobilisation fees without doing the job.

While the Goodluck Jonathan administration  handed over the certificates of ownerships to power generation and distribution companies on November 1, with over $1.957bn reportedly paid into the FG’s coffers,  its government is silent on the completion dates of  the NIPP projects scattered across the country.

These private investors have yet to convince Nigerians that they can deliver. Nigerians have yet to witness over 6,000 megawatts which was achieved under Obasanjo. The highest ever achieved under Jonathan has been fluctuating between 2,628  and 3,000 megawatts. The power generation dropped to that level in August, and the Minister of Power, in a statement by his Special Assistant on Media and Communications, Ms. Knade Daniel, said the drop was as a result of severe leaks in the supply of gas to some strategic power plants across the country.

Apart from the challenge of insufficient gas supply, the issue of payment of severance benefits to PHCN workers affected by the privatisation  deal has yet to be fully settled.

Obsolete railway

The rail system has, as the saying goes, graduated into Mars in developed and sane countries. In the UK, US, China and all, trains now come in inspiring and sophisticated shapes and offer  passengers a lot of convenience and fun. But Nigeria has yet to graduate from the narrow-gauge rail system to standard gauge, which is the modern mode, while some other countries have moved to the electronic type.

At a point, the rail system of transportation was almost dead in Nigeria. It took the administration of Obasanjo to rejuvenate some of the wagons. Some of them now go as far as Kano, Ilorin, Kaduna, Osogbo, among others on regular basis.

But visiting many of the railway stations and seeing the trains on the move show faces of destitution. Those wagons operating within Lagos metropolis – Ijoko- Agbado-Agege  to Iddo – have many passengers who do not want to pay for tickets, hanging on tail boards and the roof.

Housing for all still a mirage

The nation’s housing policy seems not to be well defined. For instance, the mortgage banks in the country, analysts say, are only interested in satisfying the yearnings of a privileged few. This has led a majority of Nigerians to either build their houses in far-flung settlements lacking in planning and modern facilities. And many cannot do that at all.

What experts say

Lecturer and a former head of Psychiatry Department, Ladoke Akintola University of Technology, Ogbomoso, Oyo State, Dr. Adeoye Oyewole, notes that at present people are developing psychiatric disorder and some are committing suicide due to socio-economic reasons.

According to him, some are dislocated, some are living in overcrowded apartment while some others are homeless.

He says, “Some of these signs of poverty and destitution are neither  peculiar to Nigeria, nor  Africa. There is also meltdown in Europe. What is lacking here is that the country does not have a structure to cushion this.

“In Europe, they have a very strong social welfare system to support the citizenry. That is why our government has failed, and this makes the economic depression more devastating. Nigerian government should look more into social welfare than infrastructure.”

The president, Campaign for Democracy, Dr. Joe Okei-Odumakin, shares the view, stressing that there are indices that support World Bank’s assertion of Nigeria.

She says it is a fact that about 90 per cent of Nigerians live below $2 per day while 70 per cent live below $1 per day.  According to her, a lot of old citizens have slumped and died while waiting endlessly on queue to collect their pension, and many youths are roaming the streets without employment.

She explains, “You can see scavengers picking from dump sites to survive, some of them are graduates. Only a few are stupendously rich while the majority wallow in abject poverty. Our education system is in shambles. Youths are taking to robbery, kidnapping and other social vices. All these indices point to the bank’s assertion. It is no exaggeration; it is the reality of what is on ground.”

A professor of Economics, Prof. Sherifdeen Tella, notes that the bank’s revelation must have been made out of research. He points out that indices of destitution are widespread both in rural and urban centres.

Tella,  who says many graduates are still living with their parents because they cannot get jobs, notes that nothing can be far for from destitution for parents to have spent so much to send their children to school and at the end of the day, they are still responsible for their upkeep.

Tella, who is a former Vice-Chancellor of the Crescent University, Abeokuta, adds, “When youths are unemployed they cannot really reach their full potential, because after graduating many of them are still living with their parents.

“The number quoted by the World Bank’s representative may not be far from the truth, indices of poverty are seen in both rural and urban centres.”

To mitigate this, Tella advises the FG to create jobs and also make the environment conducive for business to thrive.  He adds, “Power must work. And government must reduce the money being lost to corruption.”

Government’s defence

The chief economic adviser to the President, Dr. Nwanze Okidegbe has discredited the World Bank’s claim, stressing that it is ‘spurious claim’ that is ‘easily disprovable.’

 

source: The punch