FG says state governors focus on flyovers instead of poverty alleviation
The Federal Government of Nigeria has blamed the state governments for the spate of abject poverty in Nigeria especially in the rural areas.
The Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Clement Agba, said this while briefing newsmen in after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in Abuja yesterday. The meeting which was chaired by the president, Muhammad Buhari.
The minister accused the state governors engaging in white elephant projects such as bridges and airports in their state capitals rather than engaging in projects that will improve the lives of the poor living in the rural communities.
Agba noted lamented that 72% of Nigeria’s poor live in neglected rural communities where there are no social amenities while the state governors use the scarce resources to build unnecessary expensive projects which do not add value to the lives of the people.
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He said that the “The governors are basically functioning in their state capitals. And democracy that we preach about is delivering the greatest goods to the greatest number of people. And from our demography, it shows that the greatest number of our people live in rural areas, but the governors are not working in the rural areas.
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“Right now 70 per cent of our people live in rural areas. They produce 90 per cent of what we eat. And unfortunately 60 per cent of what they produce is lost due to post harvest loss and it does not get to the market.
“I think from the Federal Government’s side we are doing our best. But we need to say that rather than governors continuing to compete to take loans to build airports that are not necessary, where they have other airports so close to them, or governors now competing to build flyovers all over the place, we appeal that they should concentrate on building rural roads so that the farmer can at least get their products to the market.”
In a recent survey by the Nigerian Bauru of Statistics, which listed the poorest states in Nigeria, Sokoto ranked the poorest state in Nigeria followed by Bayelsa.
The minister lamented that a state like Bayelsa which is oil rich with high federal allocation should have no reason to be poor if the governors did their jobs.
“The result clearly shows that 72 per cent of poverty is in the rural areas. It also showed clearly that Sokoto State is leading in poverty with 91 per cent.
“But the surprising thing is Bayelsa being the second in terms of poverty rating in the country. So, you see the issue is not about availability of money. But it has to do with the application of money.
“In the course of working on the national development plan, we looked at previous plans and asked why they didn’t do as much as expected. We also looked at the issues of the National Social Investment Programme.
“At the federal level, the government is putting out so much money but not seeing so much reflection in terms of money that has been put into alleviating poverty, which is one of the reasons the government also put in place the national poverty reduction with growth strategy.
“But if the federal government puts the entire income that it earns into all of this without some form of complementarity from the state governments in playing their part, it will seem as if we are throwing money in the pond.”
Furthermore, Agba blamed the current food inflation in the country on poor rural-urban roads. The minister noted that farm produce were cheap at the rural areas where they are produced but expensive in the urban areas because there is no good roads for the farmers to bring their produce to the cities.
“UNIDO report shows us in terms of employment, the MSMEs employ 70 per cent of our people. So, you can imagine how much progress we will make when there are roads and power in these rural areas.
“In terms of agriculture, you find out that the federal government doesn’t have land that they would plant. The government has pushed for the Anchor Borrowers programme and that is going on very well but the state control lands states. They are the ones to provide land for agriculture. They are not investing in that. They would rather build skyscrapers in a city where people will see and clap but the skyscrapers do not put food on the table.
“When we’re talking about food prices, like I mentioned right now is driving inflation, prices of food at the farm gates are low. But when you now take it to the urban areas, you find out that the prices are high due to supply chain disruptions or lack of infrastructure to take them there,” he said.