By Bisi Olominu

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Nigeria as a country is going through hard times. Things are becoming difficult on a daily basis. Prices of commodities and services are becoming astronomical, beyond the reach of the ordinary man on the street. Our youths are into prostitution and Yahoo Yahoo, just to evade the poverty in the land.

President Mohammadu Buhari while campaigning ahead of the 2015 general elections, made several promises to the electorate. They were contained not only in the APC manifesto but also in his campaign documents.

The party’s campaign was based on the catchword ”CHANGE”, but today many are wallowing in abject poverty. President Mohammadu Buhari still has less than two years to redeem his image by implementing programmes and policies that will alleviate the plight of Nigerians.

Christmas is just few days away and many will celebrate with empty stomach. The festival is the time to exchange love and gifts, but many may not be able to do this as a result of the downward economy.

Although Christmas is celebrated by Christians, today some Muslims too are coming out to celebrate Christmas. The festival has turned into a cosmopolitan, cultural, and social celebration marked and enjoyed worldwide by different religious adherents. In Nigeria, a religiously diverse nation, many homes, Muslims, Christians, and traditional religion participate in the spirit of friendship and comradeship among different people, enjoy harmless fun, exchange gifts, and share the love that is the hallmark of Christmas.

The frenzy of Christmas and new year celebrations will soon remove our attention from more immense socio-economic challenges pushing Nigeria to the edge. To say that the country is going nadir is an understatement. Indeed things are not working in Nigeria, but Nigerians never allowed any political, economic, or social condition to dampen their Christmas and New Year spirits as they enter the celebration mood especially starting from the first week of December.

No matter what the year has brought, people go into Christmas and New Year celebrations with renewed hope for the bright future of Nigeria. The festivity may be low key for some, and others may still explore fun to the maximum. For some, Omicron variant of COVID-19 may define how they spend the seasonal celebrations.
However, Nigerians have concerns they wish their leaders and government could address so they can have fulfilled celebrations and look forward to 2022 with hope and optimism.

These concerns emanate from the yearly experience of people nearer to Christmas celebrations, and these issues have been a recurring decimal in Nigeria during the infamous ember months. Top on the list is insecurity.

There have always been fears of insecurity during Christmas period because of a sense of heightened quest to make money legitimately and unscrupulously among many people, especially the youths, the desire to show off with the latest gadgets, toys, cars, clothes, and other accoutrements of ostentation pushes many people to engage in various forms of criminality.

The issue of insecurity should be tackled with dispatch. The way our soldiers are being wasted for unjust in the country is worrisome. This is the actual time for them to enjoy democracy, when they are not in government but are at the war fronts fighting to unite the entity called Nigeria.

In recent times, insecurity has taken a more sinister dimension than it did previously; The secessionist agitations in the Southeast, the banditry and terrorism of the Northeast and Northwest, the mayhem of Fulani herders and their conflicts with farmers in the Southwest and middle belt region. We also have kidnapping and militancy in the South-South and this means that most nooks and crannies of Nigeria are insecure. Some have a yearly ritual of travelling back to their villages to commune with and God. This year, many are having a rethink about making those journeys.

Travelling by road should be made more secure by the government. I sincerely hope that government will give Nigerians the Christmas gift of providing robust security during this festive season on our major highways. This should not be too much for government to do, knowing fully well that kidnappers and their peers would be on the road to carry out their nefarious activities, government should make our roads free during and after the yelutide.

Besides insecurity in the land, traffic management is another issue in Nigeria. Traffic hold ups are prevalent in most urban areas, but with the festive season approaching, this exacerbates and becomes a source of anguish and irritation to drivers and passengers. Government should start on time to plan how to provide robust traffic management and control systems, utilising modern technology. An efficient road traffic control system is a great Christmas gift Nigerians will cherish from the government.

Our gateways are often overwhelmed at peak times during the Christmas season. The airports especially are crowded with people coming back from big cities or abroad to spend Christmas with their families. Often, with crowding comes the collapse of efficient service provision, touting, flouting of rules and best practices in safety, poor crowd management and flouting of laws on COVID 19.

The government will use the little time it has now to plan and implement an efficient and effective airport management system that is fit for purpose and will utilise appropriate resources to run the airports effectively. Foreigners and visitors must feel welcomed to Nigeria and have a positive perception of Nigeria in the first few minutes of entering our airports.

Christmas is a festive season, and food prices tend to go up due to high demand. This year has been exceptional. Food prices through the year have been increasing beyond ten percent . Already, the cost of staple food has gone beyond the affordability of many Nigerians. Although the government does not have direct control over the cost of food, Nigerians will appreciate any intervention the government can make to stabilise the price of food. Any measure taken by the government to stabilise the cost of food will be a Christmas gift most Nigerians will love.

Next to food price issue is the rising cost of fuel and gasoline. The gas price has increased by over 200 percent in the past one year. The price of petrol, although stable for now, is feared to rise drastically if the government goes ahead to remove the fuel subsidy. Nigerians at the lower ebb of the economic strata are feeling the bite of the increase in fuel and gas prices.

If they cannot afford foodstuff and Gas to cook food, that will threaten their existence. The direct implications of this are the prevalence of malnutrition, diseases and sometimes death.

An increase in transport fare due to a rise in the cost of fuel will have a significant negative impact on poor people. Fuel scarcity is prevalent during the Christmas period. We hope that the government will put all strategies and operations in place to avert any fuel scarcity and force the price of goods not to skyrocket during this festive period. Any positive action in this direction from the government will be a great Christmas gift for many Nigerians.

The reality is that fears are growing that inflation could burn red hot, as Nigerians pay higher prices on everything from airfares and electricity to rents, fuel, transport, food items and cooking Gas. The government should not be aloof to these fears and concerns but must work collaboratively with the private sector to reduce these concerns on many Nigerian citizens. On the side of the citizens, we expect economic common sense. People must avoid the temptation of seeing this season as a period of profligacy.

Nigerians need a new lease of hope and optimism buoyed by a combination of heightened government action on security and a clear roadmap of tackling our immediate economic, social, and political challenges. That way we can navigate the future with confidence.

Again, the Federal Government should shelve the proposed hike in fuel and electricity prices slated for next year. It is so glaring that our economy cannot withstand another strike action. Adding these to Nigerians who have already been traumatized and going through economic depression would make the country to snowball into another round of conflagration. The president should learn from the #EndSARS debacle and note that adding more sorrows to Nigerians in the new should be avoided.