By Babatunde Ayedoju
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The decision of the Federal Government to finally remove fuel subsidy about two months ago came after much hesitation by successive governments. However, as expected, the fuel subsidy removal brought untold hardships on Nigerians because the pump price of fuel moved up immediately from N195 to N500 and later N617. Consequently, a lot of generators in homes and offices had to embark on holiday. Even car owners now opt for public transport which appears to be more economical, though commercial drivers and motorcyclists are complaining about the loss they suffer daily.
It can be said that the hardship that followed the fuel subsidy removal did not catch the government unawares, as former president Muhammadu Buhari, as far back as April, already disclosed that his government secured $800 million loan from the World Bank as part of its post-subsidy palliative plans.
The incumbent president, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, decided to follow up on that when he said that his government was going to pay N8,000 to 12 million poor households over a period of six months from the proposed World Bank loan.
There were media reports last month that the National Assembly also amended the N819.5 billion 2022 supplementary budget and, in the process, approved N70 billion to support the “working conditions” of new lawmakers, while allocating N500 billion for Nigerians to cushion the effects of fuel subsidy removal.
Out of the N819.5 billion, N185 billion was earmarked for the Ministry of Works and Housing to alleviate the impact of the flooding disaster suffered in the country in 2022; N19.2 billion was allocated to the Ministry of Agriculture to ameliorate the massive destruction to farmlands across the country during the flooding experienced last year; N35 billion to National Judicial Council, and N10 billion to Federal Capital Territory Administration for critical projects.
Nigerians, including labour leaders, greeted the N8,000 monthly palliative for 12 million poor households and the National Assembly’s supplementary budget with an outrage, with some even questioning the formula by which the Federal Government intended to track the 12 million poor households. Others were of the opinion that the amount was too meagre to be of any significant impact on the poor Nigerians who were already suffering from the aftermath of the subsidy removal, suggesting that government should find other ways to ease their sufferings. All these prompted the presidency to ‘review’ the N8,000 monthly palliative.
Some Nigerians also believed that the N70 billion naira earmarked for lawmakers was a “gift” from the executive but the Senate speedily denied that allegation, saying that the money was meant for the facelift of the National Assembly and not for individual lawmakers.
By the way, quite a number of states have rolled out their palliative measures, such as reducing the number of work days and rolling out buses to ease transportation for their residents.
It should be noted that palliative is not a new word in the lexicon of Nigeria’s politics. The Muhammadu Buhari administration set up the National Social Investment Programme (NSIP) during his first tenure. Handled by the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, NSIP was divided into four clusters, namely Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP), N-Power, National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme and the Conditional Cash Transfer Scheme. GEEP itself had components such as Trader Moni, Market Moni and Farmer Moni.
Initially managed by the office of Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo, Trader Moni was launched in 2018 to provide soft loans of N10,000 to Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs). Unfortunately, according to the Kwara State Focal Person for NSIP at that time, Hajia Bashirah Abdulrazaq-Sanusi, those who disbursed the money to SMEs did not have any record of the beneficiaries. Therefore, hardly did those beneficiaries pay back the money, because, according to Abdulrazaq-Sanusi, they saw it as their own portion of the proverbial national cake.
The Federal Government also set up the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme to provide food for school children across the country, as a way of steming the tide of out-of-school children in Nigeria. The United Nations Children Emergency Fund (UNICEF), through its representative in Nigeria, Peter Hawkins, had said that Nigeria had the highest rate of out-of-school children in the world – 10.5 million children.
The school feeding programme reportedly created jobs for about 127,000 cooks and 100 aggregators, while about 10 million pupils benefitted across 53,000 schools. While the then Minister for Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Hajiya Sadiya Umar Farouq, said that the school feeding programme led to an increase in school enrollment, the programme suffered hiccups in some states.
In several states of the federation, there were complaints about insufficient cooks, irregular payments, meddlesomeness of contractors, resignation of cooks and high cost of foodstuffs in the market, among other factors.
Also, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Buhari Government unveiled some palliatives to ease the effect of the pandemic and lockdown but many Nigerians lamented that the palliative government promised to provide did either not get to them or was too small to assuage their sufferings, making the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development under the headship of Hajiya Sadiya Umar Farouq came under severe media attacks during the period.
One of those palliatives was the N20,000 Conditional Cash Transfer Scheme. The disbursement kicked off in Kwali Area Council of the Federal Capital Territory and some parts of Nassarawa State.
Hajiya Farouq, at a point, reportedly claimed that over 2.6 million households had benefited from the palliative and that over 11 million vulnerable persons had been identified in 35 states who were yet to benefit from the palliative measure then.
Many Nigerians wondered what criteria were employed to conclude that the poorest people were in Nasarawa State. Critics also claimed that some videos of the exercise making the rounds on social media showed that some of the beneficiaries could not be said to belong to the category being described as the poorest of the poor, as they looked well-fed.
Not to be soon forgotten were the COVID-19 palliatives provided by CACOVID, a group of donors that provided foodstuffs to ameliorate the effect of COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown on Nigerians. The palliatives which, probably, should have been distributed during the lockdown in 2020 were found in various warehouses across the country by protesters during the ENDSARS protest in October 2020.
April 2021, a civic advocacy group, BudgIT, published a report on COVID-19 management titled: “COVID-19 Fund: Fiscal Support, Palliative Analysis and Institutional Response” based on its investigation on how CACOVID palliatives were expended in states such as Lagos, Ogun, Rivers, and Niger.
According to the report, in most of the places studied, palliatives were hijacked and diverted by politicians who shared them among party members. For instance, there were reports of one derica of rice, one derica of beans and a sachet of tomato paste were given to a street with more than 30 houses.
The BudgIT report further stated that as of April 7, 2020, CACOVID had received donations totalling N21.5 billion but comprehensive details of the disbursed funds had not been published on the Open Treasury Platform at the time the report was published.
While tracing the origin of palliatives to former President Goodluck Jonathan’s SURE-P project, Professor Simon Ehiabhi from the Department of History and International Studies, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko, opined that palliative does not have any effect on the people, describing it as an unaccountable ways of diverting public funds.
Questioning the way Federal Government intends to trace the 12 million poor households in a country with a population of over 200 million, the university don recommended that government should review salaries of workers in line with the inflationary trend, the way it is done in developed countries, and invest in infrastructural development
While making an allusion to COVID-19 palliatives and school feeding programme of the Federal Government, Dr Bayo Fasunwon from the Department of Political Science, Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko, expressed concern that while palliative is good, the Nigerian factor can make it become a means of legally embezzling money.
Still on failed attempts in the past by government to provide palliatives for citizens, Dr Fasunwon said, “Till today, we’ve not seen the list of vulnerable people published. I have also not seen any school child being fed in my area. The truth is that, every Nigerian today is vulnerable, including the rich.”
The political economy scholar noted that the $800 million which Federal Government initially wanted to distribute as palliative is enough to build a new refinery. He, therefore, advised that the government should provide infrastructure that would improve the condition of life of Nigerians, describing such as better palliatives. He equally added that if people use less fuel, the price of every commodity would definitely come down.
Dr Ilesanmi Aiyedoju, a veterinarian, was of the opinion that any palliative introduced by government cannot be trusted, because it is most likely to be misappropriated. While noting that no palliative can cushion the hardship that the present administration has thrown Nigerians into, he added that even increase in salaries and allowances would only worsen the situation, because that would lead to increased price of commodities and services.
He, therefore, concluded that the only palliative that may be of help is price control.
