By Tajudeen Atitebi
Lagos, May 29, 2024 – As President Bola Tinubu marks his first year in office, his biggest challenge is the successful resolution of the current food crisis ravaging the country.
Over the years, there have been concerns about the prospect of food insecurity in Nigeria, but the reality has now dawned on Nigerians as they now contend with hunger and starvation.
Today, there is hardship across the country caused by hunger as average Nigerians can barely feed them selves.
Food items are becoming scarce and are priced beyond the reach of average Nigerians where available.
The food crisis, in turn, has adversely impacted on the living conditions of average Nigerans. Nigerians can no longer afford what they desire to eat, but eat what is available.
The crisis has taken a turn for the worst in the last one year.
Bishop Mathew Kukah, the Bishop of Roman Catholic Diocese of Sokoto, described the current situation as painful and unbearable.
“Nigerians are in various levels of pains and they are pains that are unintended. They are as a result of certain policy decisions of government.
“I believe that the times that we are in are very, very difficult times, and nobody should be under any illusion,” Kukah said this during a recent visit to President Tinubu.
According to the Nigeria Economic Summit Group (NESG), the number of underfed Nigerians is rising by the day.
It said the number had risen significantly in the last one year from 66.2 million in the first quarter of 2023 to 100 million in first quarter of 2024, with 18.6 million facing acute hunger.
The NESG said about 43.7 million Nigerians were showing crisis-level or above crisis-level hunger as at March 2024.
The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) attributed the worsening living condition and general hardship to economic policies of the government and the general insecurity across the country.
It expressed concern over the escalation of insecurity in the northern region, warning that “the protracted dimension of the problems are harbingers of social chaos.”
At the outset of the administration, Tinubu announced with glee two major economic policies as the plank of his administration.
He announced the removal of subsidy on petrol price and reform of foreign exchange market.
Ideally, these two policies are good on paper and present bright prospects for the future of country given the prevailing economic situation in the country then.
The policies were aimed at checking abuses and the endemic corruption in the system.
Hitherto, Nigerians enjoyed some modicum of price subsidy on petrol, which according to some experts, has distorted economic planning and engendered corrupt practices in the petroleum industry.
The reform of the foreign exchange market also looked bright in view of the multiple naira exchange rates and attendant corrupt practices through arbitraging.
But rather than improve the lives of average Nigerians, the implementation of these policies has worsened their socio-economic conditions.
On May 29, 2023 when Tinubu assumed office, the official exchange rate of naira to the dollar was ₦460.7202, but the currency has depreciated to N1,486.81 as at May 24, 2024.
The official price of petrol was N165 per litre in May 2023, but it is now on the average of N560 per litre.
The price of petrol rose to between N900 and N1,200 per litre in April this year due to non-availability of the product.
Inflation, the measure of rising prices, stood at 33.69% in April, the 16th consecutive month of price increases in Nigeria.
According to the Nigeria Bureau of Statistics (NBS), food inflation has been the main driver of the rising inflation rate.
It reported that food inflation rose to 40.53% year-on-year basis from 24.61% in January 2023, driven largely by increasing price of staple foods.
Currently, a 50kg bag of rice is being sold at about N90,000 against the average of N35,000 in April 2023. A bag of beans, which was sold at N45,000 in April 2023, is now N275,000.
The price of a bag of onion was N15,000 in April 2023, but now N135,000, a basket of tomato was N6,000, but now N280,000, while a big tuber of yam which was sold for N1,000, is now sold at N3,500 in Lagos.
Given the current reality, Nigerians said their high expectation from Tinubu’s administration has been dashed as the economic situations worsens.
But some experts are arguing that Tinubu’s administration cannot bear the entire blame as the general insecurity across the country is also a factor.
It may be true as the farmer-herder crises across the country have forced many farmers away from the farms, precipitating food shortages.
Sonny Iroche, a Senior Academic Visitor at the African Studies Centre, University of Oxford, said Nigeria had been facing imminent food scarcity for two decades now, from the tenure of former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s tenure to Buhari’s tenure.
Across the country, many farmers have abandoned their farms due to rampant banditry and escalating insecurity.
According to official figures, more than 165 farmers have been killed in farmer-herder violence just in 2024.
In some states, bandits have imposed taxes on farmers before they could access their farms. Farmers in Sokoto State were said to have paid N3 billion in ransom to bandits.
The All-Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN) confirmed reports that farmers in the North pay terrorists as much as N100,000 to gain access to their farmlands during planting or harvest seasons. Non-compliant farmers risk abduction, violence or confiscation of their produce.
In May this year, bandits invaded Unguwar Jibo and Nasarawa communities in Kachia LGA of Kaduna state and ordered all the farmers to raise N100,000 each as part of the conditions to be allowed to cultivate their lands for giving information to troops about their movement and location.
Aside from the two villages, three neighbouring communities of Gidan-Makeri, Hayin Dam and Dogon-Daji under Kagarko Local Government Area were also asked to raise N100,000 each by the bandits.
“Apart from the N100,000, each farmer was also asked to buy foodstuffs and drugs for them every two weeks as the second condition before they would be allowed to cultivate their farms.
“If you recall, last week, some farmers in Unguwar Jibo and Nasarawa were chased away from their farms by bandits when they suspected the farmers to be behind giving information to troops about their movement.
“The problem is that 95 per cent of our people are peasant farmers,” one of the village heads said.
Aside from peasant farmers, commercial farmers are not spared by the bandits.
The Okomu Oil Palms in Edo State was attacked by armed men two times in a row in May this year.
Graham Hefer, its Managing Director, said the first attack on May 6, led to the death of three plantation workers, while four workers were injured in another attack on May 7.
So, given this scenario, President Tinubu has a crisis on his hand which he must resolve immediately to avert a looming chaos. (GBN)
