The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • To Bokkos with counter-salvo

    To Bokkos with counter-salvo

    Hardball

     

    IN Plateau State University (PLASU) at Bokkos, the lecturers lined together behind the artillery and launched a series of attacks at the state governor, Simon Lalong, and the government. One of such was that the governor had no infrastructure work on campus. They also asserted that the ongoing activities in the name of government work belonged only to TETFUND, also known as Tertiary Education Fund.

    The PLASU artillery was still emitting smoke when the government officials led by the governor drove to the campus, and rallied his own. Some might call his counter-punch a surgical strike. Surgical strikes have no time for superfluity. They prize precision over waste. It is an economy of destruction.  As the field commander, Governor Lalong fired back his own cannon in fury.

    He said the impression the lecturers gave was that he was a mere sitting duck of tertiary development as governor in the working of the university, and he needed to clear the matter and let the smoke and dust settle. If they said he had not done any roads, what was their answer to the 13-kilometre dual-carriage way within the campus? Is it ghosts that ride it, or the vehicles of the same brilliant minds who teach and research on that soil?

    Or shall they ponder the 27-kilometre street lights that beam under the Bokkos heavens and preside luminously over their buildings and verdure? Lamps don’t lie, neither do the blind not see the illuminations that separate them from the saturnine sprawl outside the campus.

    Or will anyone deny that Lalong released N279 million to ac credit 14 programmes in the school? Accreditation is the life and blood of any programme. Not to accredit is not to stand as a faculty or department. So the PLASU artillery launchers should give credit to whom it is due. Three new faculties have also been approved on his watch, and they are law, health sciences and agriculture.

    Who would say that the work on the College of Health Sciences is not whirring ahead with the construction of the Teaching Hospital in Shendam?

    If they say some other projects and a few of these have a TETFUND component, the state will reply that it was the influence of the state chief executive that brought those gems to the campus. So, they should learn to put grievances where they should be. For sure, they need allowances, and the governor has set up a seven-man committee to look into all grievances.

    The resort to strike is a constitutionally guaranteed right, and the lectures are entitled to their rage, but not to anyone’s lies.

    So, it is to Bokkos with salvos and counter-salvos. Whatever the state of war, the lecturers should know that the floor beneath the elephants is a stretch of students whose time is being killed by pettifogging brawls. After the war-war, a jaw-jaw must follow, as has always been the case.

  • Oluwo’s haven

    Oluwo’s haven

    Hardball

    If he truly has the supernatural unction he boasts, the Oluwo of Iwo, Oba Abdulrosheed Akanbi, should consider urgently extending its efficacy beyond his traditional domain. Nigeria and indeed most countries of the world are wasting from the new wave of the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) and could do with a covering – mystical / mythical or not – that invariably neutralizes infection by the pandemic once you come within its potency range.

    In recent weeks, this country had been recording huge daily case count, peaking at nearly 2,000 new infections by the virus towards last weekend. Records of fatality from related complications have been in bumper double digits per day. The present wave is clearly more ferocious than the first wave in 2020, which necessitated a lockdown of the socio-economic life of the country. Government has been reluctant to impose another lockdown, with citizens as well also preferring to do without because of the ruinous effect on corporate and individual economies. It is a difficult choice, as there is a heavy toll of victims falling to the pandemic while Nigerians await access to vaccines.

    The Oluwo touted a spurious panacea when he claimed a magical power that makes anybody with Covid-19 infection who enters the Iwo community automatically healed. Speaking recently at a ceremony to mark the fifth anniversary of his ascension to the throne, the monarch said: “God has bestowed power on kings to legislate on his behalf on earth and I want to thank God that he has been supporting me since I became the king of this ancient town. Within the five years of my reign, the community has witnessed a series of development. My subjects are living happily and healthy. We have not had any issue of coronavirus. Anybody with Covid-19 that enters Iwo will be automatically healed.” The Oba, however, urged adherence to safety protocols prescribed by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) and prayed for an end to the pandemic.

    If not for lack of proof of this purported cure, the audacity of the claim and magnitude of the problem were enough to trigger a national stampede to the ancient domain in search of Covid-19 cure. In the alternative, the Iwo monarch could extend the scope of the cure’s potency.

    Let no one bother with those options, however, because Oba Akanbi apparently spoke tongue-in-cheek. The ‘no record of Covid-19’ claim concerning Iwo, if true, is more providential that mystical, and a function of the townsfolk’s adherence to the non-pharmaceutical protocols, which everybody else should emulate. That is why it is helpful the monarch made the point of urging adherence to safety protocols. But, by the way, isn’t the experience of Covid-19 too serious a national challenge to make light of with untruthful claims?

  • Royal flippancy

    Royal flippancy

    Hardball

     

     

    If the Oluwo of Iwo, Oba Abdulrasheed Akanbi, is to be believed, his domain in Osun State should attract people battling with COVID-19. During an event to mark his 5th coronation anniversary, the 53-year-old traditional ruler not only boasted that no one in the town had contracted the coronavirus since it was first detected in the country in February 2020  but also bragged that anybody with COVID-19  would be completely healed once the person set foot on Iwo soil.

    Just like that?  Yes, it’s that simple, according to Oba Akanbi. He didn’t explain how such a cure would happen.  Perhaps he didn’t need to give any explanation.  All he said was: “My subjects are living happily and healthy. We did not have any issue of coronavirus. Anybody with COVID-19 that enters Iwo will be automatically healed.”

    Secretary to the Osun State Government Prince Wole Oyebamiji in a statement this week ordered civil servants below level 12 to stay at home indefinitely from January 25 to check the spread of COVID-19. The government said:  “There will be a dusk to dawn curfew every day from 10:00 pm till 5:00 am. Enforcement teams have been set up in every Local Government and Area Office across the State, to ensure strict enforcement of the protocols.

    “Any hotel, event centre, mall, joint or business that is found flouting the safety directives will be sealed, and will only be reopened upon the payment of a fine of N250,000.”

    Teachers, health workers and other workers on essential services are allowed to go to work, and schools are expected to “maintain all safety protocols.”

    “On religious gathering,” the government said “vigils and crusades are banned and no service must exceed two hours,” warning that “Churches and mosques found flouting the safety directives will be sealed, and will only be reopened upon the payment of a fine of N50, 000.”

    It is noteworthy that Commissioner for Information and Civic Orientation Funke Egbemode this week announced that two cabinet members in the administration of Osun State Governor Gboyega Oyetola had tested positive for COVID-19.

    According to figures released yesterday evening, the state has recorded 1,318 lab confirmed cases of COVID-19; 258 people are on admission; 1,033 have been discharged; and there have been 27 deaths.

    The state government’s latest anti-COVID-19 measures seem reasonable in the circumstances.  But would it be reasonable to move those being treated for COVID-19 in the state to Iwo to be “automatically healed,” as guaranteed by Oba Akanbi?  There is only one word to describe the traditional ruler and his utterance: flippant.

  • Chauvinist undone

    Chauvinist undone

    Hardball

     

    I magine a male chauvinist, or even outright misogynist, thrashed by women?  The ultimate humiliation, wouldn’t you say?

    That is the fate of Donald J. Trump, the 45th US president, yesterday booted from power, virtually screaming and screeching!

    Everyone knows of the titanic clash of Trump and US House of Representatives Speaker, California Democrat Nancy Pelosi.  The other day, at a State of the Union address at the Capitol, Trump snubbed a handshake from Pelosi, leaving Madam Speaker’s hand hanging, mid-air, in un-congressional embarrassment.

    One never to allow such a public spite to slide, Pelosi ripped Trump’s speech, in the full glare of frenzied cameras, claiming the speech was as useless as its empty giver, Mr. President!

    But that was even after Madam Speaker had awarded Mr. President mock clapping, with a derisive sliding her two palms — all the three gestures, Trump’s original slight and Pelosi’s twin-response in kind, made media headlines after!

    So, you can imagine Pelosi’s utmost satisfaction to oversee Trump’s unprecedented twin-impeachment, within a single, four-year presidential term!  If the first was happenstance, the second was plain dumb, coming off a Trump-powered Capitol mob!

    Pelosi may yet see to Trump’s dubious record of being the first impeached US President to be convicted, though after leaving office; and banished from any future public office, aside from forfeiture of all post-office benefits!  How art the mighty — sorry, misogynist — fallen!

    Still, the unkindest cut of all might be the Trump loss of the Georgia battle of the street — Trump the unfazed general of the American political streets, with his zombie-like mob of hoi-polloi Republican fanatics!

    Again, his arch conqueror was — double horror of horrors — a certain Black woman and Atlanta grassroots mobilizer and Yale Law School alumna, Stacey Yvonne Abrams!

    Stacey, Stacey! That’s one Amazon Trump and his MAGA army won’t forget in a hurry!  At the end of “hostilities”, Georgia had returned its most unlikely pair of senators ever: an African-American — and a Martin Luther King disciple to boot! — Raphael Warnock; and a Jewish American, Jon Ossof — mere 33 years, and the youngest Democratic senator, since the 30-year old Joe Biden’s feat of 1973!

    Trump rumbled into town, mouthing his accustomed profanities and inanities: spewing personal grudges on his own failed re-election, instead of promoting the doomed senatorial duo; and traducing the Georgia governor and Secretary of State, for doing their electoral duty by law; and wondering who the hell was this upstart called Stacey.

    Abrams, on the other hand, crested a 10-year electoral work by rallying Black votes for her two Democratic candidates, as if the voters’ lives depended on the outcome.  When the result came, the difference was clear — to parody the famous 7-up commercial!

    History would record: Trump, amoral male chauvinist and garrulous misogynist, was undone by the very same female folks he loved, with a swagger, to belittle, in the most crucial political battles of his life!

    Male chauvinist thrashed by “mere” women?  Sweet, isn’t that?

  • Chauvinist undone

    Chauvinist undone

    Hardball

     

    IMAGINE a male chauvinist, or even outright misogynist, thrashed by women?  The ultimate humiliation, wouldn’t you say?

    That is the fate of Donald J. Trump, the 45th US president, yesterday booted from power, virtually screaming and screeching!

    Everyone knows of the titanic clash of Trump and US House of Representatives Speaker, California Democrat Nancy Pelosi.  The other day, at a State of the Union address at the Capitol, Trump snubbed a handshake from Pelosi, leaving Madam Speaker’s hand hanging, mid-air, in un-congressional embarrassment.

    One never to allow such a public spite to slide, Pelosi ripped Trump’s speech, in the full glare of frenzied cameras, claiming the speech was as useless as its empty giver, Mr. President!

    But that was even after Madam Speaker had awarded Mr. President mock clapping, with a derisive sliding her two palms — all the three gestures, Trump’s original slight and Pelosi’s twin-response in kind, made media headlines after!

    So, you can imagine Pelosi’s utmost satisfaction to oversee Trump’s unprecedented twin-impeachment, within a single, four-year presidential term!  If the first was happenstance, the second was plain dumb, coming off a Trump-powered Capitol mob!

    Pelosi may yet see to Trump’s dubious record of being the first impeached US President to be convicted, though after leaving office; and banished from any future public office, aside from forfeiture of all post-office benefits!  How art the mighty — sorry, misogynist — fallen!

    Still, the unkindest cut of all might be the Trump loss of the Georgia battle of the street — Trump the unfazed general of the American political streets, with his zombie-like mob of hoi-polloi Republican fanatics!

    Again, his arch conqueror was — double horror of horrors — a certain Black woman and Atlanta grassroots mobilizer and Yale Law School alumna, Stacey Yvonne Abrams!

    Stacey, Stacey! That’s one Amazon Trump and his MAGA army won’t forget in a hurry!  At the end of “hostilities”, Georgia had returned its most unlikely pair of senators ever: an African-American — and a Martin Luther King disciple to boot! — Raphael Warnock; and a Jewish American, Jon Ossof — mere 33 years, and the youngest Democratic senator, since the 30-year old Joe Biden’s feat of 1973!

    Trump rumbled into town, mouthing his accustomed profanities and inanities: spewing personal grudges on his own failed re-election, instead of promoting the doomed senatorial duo; and traducing the Georgia governor and Secretary of State, for doing their electoral duty by law; and wondering who the hell was this upstart called Stacey.

    Abrams, on the other hand, crested a 10-year electoral work by rallying Black votes for her two Democratic candidates, as if the voters’ lives depended on the outcome.  When the result came, the difference was clear — to parody the famous 7-up commercial!

    History would record: Trump, amoral male chauvinist and garrulous misogynist, was undone by the very same female folks he loved, with a swagger, to belittle, in the most crucial political battles of his life!

    Male chauvinist thrashed by “mere” women?  Sweet, isn’t that?

  • Amotekun!! Amotekun!!!!

    Amotekun!! Amotekun!!!!

    Hardball

    Among the Yoruba (not sure if same goes for other Nigerian tongues), there is a     cultural practice of calling the attention of someone going errant back to the     path of rectitude. The way this practice goes is: you call the fellow’s name twice  (or thrice, if necessary) with a distinctly ominous ring – atimes, you even ask the fellow almost rhetorically: ‘How many times did I call you? – and with the last mention of the name drawn out with a more emphatic ominousness. That is what we are doing here with the Western Nigeria Security Network, codenamed Amotekun, especially the Oyo State chapter.

    Amotekun is an initiative of the South-west states to help themselves against worsening insecurity that the conventional agencies, especially the Police, have seem far too stretched and disconnected from local communities to effectively tackle. The outfit is projected as complementary and not parallel to the main agencies; but it has grassroots flavour needed to engender communal ownership believed to be key to dealing with the insecurity scourge, which unfortunately is lacking in the conventional  agencies. Amotekun in Oyo State has,  however, been reported perpetuating abuses that Nigerians saw in the police and rejected.

    Last week, a commercial motorcyclist was killed in Ibadan after being hit by a stray bullet from an Amotekun operative. In an account of the incident by which it fired the trigger-happy operative, Amotekun  said the victim was shot late Wednesday evening by agent Kazeem Afolabi when the corps responded to a distress-call   over  a   purported  armed   robbery  attack  at   Total   Filling Station, Mokola. Agency commandant,  Col. Olayanju Olayinka (rtd.), explained in a statement that though the operatives found there was indeed no robbery attack, a crowd had gathered at the scene and Kazeem, feeling threatened by that crowd, opened fire to allegedly scare the people away. But his shot hit 23-year-old Tosin Thomas, who later died. That killing triggered a protest the following morning by colleagues of the late Thomas, which caused severe traffic gridlock around Mokola roundabout while shop owners hurriedly shuttered up for safety. Olayinka affirmed in his statement that the agency found Kazeem liable for acting outside its protocols and had summarily dismissed him and handed him over to the police for prosecution. “We want to reassure members of the public of our  internal  mechanisms  for dealing  with  erring officers.  We will continue   to   train   and   retrain   our   officers   on   best   practices   and   rules   of engagement,” he added.

    Before this incident, there were recent reports of high-handedness and extra-judicial killings by Amotekun agents, prompting Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka to warn that the outfit must not transform into something like the disbanded Special Anti-Robbery   Squad   (SARS)   of   the   police.   He   advised   that   the operatives be trained on ethics so that they do not end up on the wrong side of history.

    Hmmm. Amotekun!! Amotekun!!!! How many times did Hardball call you? A word is enough for the wise.

  • IPOB’s delusions

    IPOB’s delusions

    Hardball

    It’s obvious that Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) is desperately seeking relevance.  After launching its Eastern Security Network (ESN), which it described as “a vigilance group, established to protect Biafrans against terrorists,” IPOB says there is no room for another regional security outfit in the Southeast and South-south.

    This is the group’s response to moves by Southeast governors to establish a security organisation to help tackle insecurity in the region.  “We declare without equivocation that any other group parading as a South-East and South-South security outfit will not be allowed to operate on Biafra soil,” IPOB said.  “Our people have already launched their own defence line… ESN has been launched with the mandate of securing Biafra land, and no force can disband this great movement until it’s done with its mandate!”

    IPOB conveniently forgets that it is a proscribed group, meaning that it is illegal and its activities are illegal.  It is said that you can’t build something on nothing. How can the group claim to have a security outfit for the mentioned areas when it is not a recognised group itself? Since it is not a recognised group, its security outfit cannot be a recognised organisation.

    The separatist group is clearly delusional. It has also said that it does not recognise the new President General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Prof. George Obiozor.  “We cannot in all honesty work with him because we are not ideologically compatible,” it said. “Obiozor may not be entirely evil but those behind him are unrepentant enemies of Biafra.”

    It is noteworthy that the Igbo socio-cultural group is a recognised entity. How can an unrecognised group reject the leader of a recognised group?

    IPOB insists that there is a territory called Biafra within Nigeria. Such a territory is unknown to the country.  But the group is entitled to its delusions.

    The group contradicts itself by saying it cannot work with certain politicians demanding a president of Igbo origin in 2023.  “We know their real motives. None of the traitors on parade have Igbo Biafra’s interest at heart. They are only after their personal gains going by their antecedents,” it said.

    This suggests that the group is not against an Igbo presidency in Nigeria, but only against particular politicians clamouring for it. This further suggests that IPOB is ready to work with politicians acceptable to it to bring about an Igbo presidency. But such a president would be president of Nigeria, not Biafra.  In that case, what will happen to IPOB’s noise about Biafra?

    The group is suffering from delusions, and its condition is getting worse.

  • Trump: barring the stable door …

    Trump: barring the stable door …

    Hardball

     

    AFTER his historic, if disgraceful, double impeachment within a four-year single tenure, US President Donald Trump outed with a rather reconciliatory video, claiming to abhor every violence; and disclaiming the violent as alien to his MAGA (Make America Great Again) “movement”.  Some fib!

    But with the straight face with which Trump delivered that video performance, he really must think of everyone outside his MAGA movement (those blokes must really be too far gone) as well and truly “magas” — to borrow that Nigerian-speak, which could mean dunces!

    Give Hardball a break!  Donald Trump as peacenik, exactly one week after he serenaded his beloved mutinous gang, that sacked the US Capitol, as patriots and heroes, even after that impeachment-triggering sacking had been done!

    Why, the unstable Trump even appeared to have totally forgotten how he told his gang, live and direct, to go “fight like hell”, “show strength” and be very strong, forget the Democrats (who were clearly beyond redemption in his crazed alter-world) but instead go strong-arm and intimidate “weak” Republicans, to stop their own party mate and Trump’s own deputy, Vice President Mike Spence, from doing his constitutionally sworn duty, of certifying Joe Biden’s win as president-elect!

    And this climax of epochal shame came after two months of torrential lies over an election he lost fair and square, with outrageous claims of a landslide, thus inflaming his wild gang of insurrectionists!  Yeah right — that was a landslide in electoral defeat!  But it came with an especial vicious strain of self-ruin which only Trump could boast!

    The result?  Trump was so rotten they impeached him twice!  Pray, contrast that to the ennobling sporting lines about our very own “Jay-Jay”, Nigerian ex-international Austin Okocha: he’s so good they named him twice!

    That rebuke probably would be the damning historical byte on this unfortunate Trump era, to terminate on January 20 — four horrible years during which an unhinged, hate-filled and completely amoral American president somewhat managed to turn his America, in Jonathan Swift-speak, from a Gulliver in global affairs, to a budding Lilliput!  Remember the classic, Gulliver’s Travels?

    So, the shock of a wilful and self-crippling second impeachment could mellow Donald Trump to, for once, speak like a normal human being?

    But perhaps it was more than that!  Perhaps it was the roaring ocean of becoming a global pariah, threatening to gobble up Trump and sweep him into the smelly dung heap of history!  After Twitter, Facebook and Snapchat, almost every sane brand and business is scramming from the ultra-toxic Trump!

    But even after playing post-Capitol-storming peacenik (fake news! — as Trump would have yelled in his (un)presidential heydays), the sinister strain was there for the Republican Party, after the Trump “hostile takeover”, in the words of Jared Krushner, his beloved son-in-law: MAGA is “our movement” — that may yet do further maximum damage to the GOP of the revered Abraham Lincoln!

    No tears from here.  If GOP tolerated and rationalized the Trumpian evil of the past four years, it should brace up for its immediate consequences, aside from a harsh historical censure sure to come, when the history of this era is written.

    A peace-pushing, brand new Trump after the Capitol self-ruin?  Naaaa!  Too far-fetched — just a hustler trying to prise himself free!  But even if it turned a Trump equivalent of a Pauline conversion, it’s no more than barring the stable gate, after the stallion had galloped clear!

     

     

  • Right call, wrong timing

    Right call, wrong timing

    Hardball

     

    WITH the escalating threat of the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic, we must ask if tight timelines imposed by government for telecoms subscribers to link their National Identity Number (NIN) with their phone lines is wise at a time like this.

    Nigeria has recorded consecutive case counts of more than 1,000 new infections daily in the last one week, with many notable persons reported dead of Covid-19 complications. That, obviously, is not taking account of non-notable victims. Meanwhile, in apparent bid to curb the use of telecoms facilities for criminal exploits, government had directed all operators to block phone lines on their networks not linked to subscribers’ NIN by 30th December, last year. Following public outcry, it granted a three-week extension for subscribers already having their NIN till 19th January, 2021, and six-week extension for subscribers yet to obtain the NIN till 9th February. Still, the threat of imminent disconnection from telco networks has forced mammoth crowds of subscribers seeking registration for the NIN to National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) centres. The pressure on those centres was compounded by a strike called by the agency’s workers late last week that was suspended after 48 hours, but with the workers not back at their duty posts until Monday, this week.

    The desperation of intending registrants fostered scenes of chaos at the registration centres amid acute disregard for Covid-19 safety protocols. For instance, the huge crowds made social distancing utterly impossible, with most registrants ignoring other rules like wearing of facemasks and washing of hands. Even NIMC staff have been hazarded, and one of the reasons they ditched work last week was alleged lack of personal protective equipment which accounted for some of their members contracting Covid-19.

    Communications and Digital Economy Minister Isa Pantami put all the blame on the registrants, arguing that they were needlessly and avoidably crowding NIMC centres. Speaking on a Channels Television programme last weekend, he said: “Citizens go there (i.e. the centres), their names are not part of those to be captured but they go and stay at the gates; and if you ask them to leave they would not. Even the security agencies pleaded with them, but they would not go… It has nothing to do with the commission, it is with the citizens. We need to change our attitude.” Alluding to timing, the minister explained that his ministry, NIMC and telcos would review the entire exercise  should government impose a fresh lockdown over the pandemic.

    But that review, Hardball argues, is overdue already and should not await fresh lockdown by government. The Covid-19 second wave has made government signal it would review the proposed schedule for resumption of schools; so also has it warranted the suspension of proposed screening of new recruits by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), among others. Though the objective for NIN-phone line linkage is good, this just isn’t the best time to pursue that objective. Simple!

     

  • Zero percent poverty

    Zero percent poverty

    Hardball

     

    Nigeria needs to learn a lesson from news that China has been able to eradicate extreme poverty among its people.  That country’s last nine poor counties, all in its southwest Guizhou Province, have eliminated absolute poverty, according to a November 23 report. Independent agencies confirmed that poverty in the nine counties in Guizhou had been reduced to zero percent.

    China had planned to eradicate absolute poverty by the end of 2020. At the end of 2019, 52 counties in the northwest, southwest and south of the country were still on the poverty list. Now there is no county on its poverty list. This is a notable feat, considering that China is the world’s most populous country, with a population of around 1.4 billion in 2019.

    Nigeria’s population is about 208 million, far less than China’s. It is disturbing that more than 83 million Nigerians live below the national poverty line, according to the 2019 Poverty and Inequality in Nigeria report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) this year. Oxfam says about 94 million Nigerians live below the poverty line.

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo’s remarks at the two-day executive-legislative leadership retreat held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on October 6, spoke volumes about how poorly the government has performed concerning eradicating poverty.

    “What is the reality of the context that we operate in today?” he asked.  “We all know our nation has millions of extremely poor people; the COVID-19 pandemic has worsened employment and poverty.”

    Osibanjo added:  “It is time to focus on what we have been elected or appointed to do. This is the welfare of our people… Our people just want food on their table, shelter over their heads, clothing on their bodies, healthcare and education for their children and themselves.”

    In other words, it is easy to identify the markers of poverty.  The President Muhammadu Buhari administration last year set a target of “lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty within a 10-year period.”

    The president has inaugurated a national steering committee to oversee the development of the ‘Nigeria Agenda 2050 and Medium-Term National Development Plan (MTNDP),’ which succeeds ‘Vision 20:2020 and the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) 2017 – 2020.’

    The United Nations (UN) defines extreme poverty as “a condition characterised by severe deprivation of basic human needs, including food, safe drinking water, sanitation facilities, health, shelter, education and information. It depends not only on income but also on access to services.”

    How did China eradicate extreme poverty?  Definitely, it took more than lip service. That is a lesson Nigeria needs to learn.