- Improving the means of reaching the vulnerable
Stories like the ones that formed the plank of my write-up today usually get me depressed: (a) “DSS recovers 2,000 bags of diverted rice”, and (b) “FG begins sale of 50kg rice for N40,000”. Why do they get me depressed? They get me depressed because those engaging in the evil practices know the consequences of their actions. They know that what they are doing will harm fellow Nigerians but still go ahead to commit the crimes. And the motivation is money, nothing more. Even where, as it is being speculated in some quarters, politicians defeated at the polls and the courts are behind the evil deeds, it still boils down to the same thing: they want to control financial resources. It is not necessarily to better the lot of the people. People who would go to such satanic extent to get political power could never have had the people as the reason for their action.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) last week reported that men of the Department of State Services (DSS) in Katsina State Command recovered 2,000 25kg bags of rice out of the 20 trucks donated to the state by the Federal Government, to cushion the effects of the economic hardship in the state. It however added that the recovered rice was allegedly diverted by some government officials.
Chairman, Civil Society Organisations in the state, Mr Abdulrahman Abdullahi, expressed shock over the issue and lamented that palliatives provided by the Federal Government for the vulnerable were allegedly diverted by some unpatriotic people. He vowed that they would continue to follow the case up to its logical conclusion, and advised the government to investigate the matter, with a view to punishing those behind the diversion, if that was the case.
However, the chairman of the Market Traders Association, Alhaji Shehu Usman, said that the rice was brought into the market by someone who was not a trader. He cautioned his members against receiving such items for safekeeping in the market.
But the Principal Private Secretary (PPS) to Gov. Dikko Radda of the state, Mr Aliyu Abdullahi, said the rice was allocated to the Minister of Housing and Urban Development, Ahmed Dangiwa, by the Federal Government. “The minister directed the Special Adviser to the Governor on Infrastructure Development, Alhaji Nasiru Lawal, to keep it and he decided to take the rice to the market for safekeeping. About 1,200 bags of rice were allocated to the minister.
The second move that interests me in all of the plans being implemented or are about to be implemented to bring down food prices is the creation of designated centres where food items, including rice, would be sold at N40,000 per 50kg bag, by the Federal Government. Lagos State did a similar thing sometime ago. I hear the state government is gearing up toward resuming the process. Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, revealed the Federal Government’s plan on Monday, last week, while briefing correspondents on the outcome of the Federal Executive Council meeting presided over by President Bola Tinubu at the State House, Abuja.
About 740 trucks of grains had been sent to the states towards this end. According to the minister, this was one of several initiatives by the Tinubu administration to ease living conditions for citizens. The minister said that ”Rice is also being sold at about 50 per cent of its cost; a bag of rice is being sold as we speak. This rice has been taken to various centres across all the states of the federation and is being sold at N40,000”.
He added: “In the first instance, about 10 trucks have been made available to each of these states; indeed, this is just the beginning. I know that some of the comments you hear is that it is never enough. The government has not pretended that these supplies are indeed enough. But these are necessary first steps that are being made and more of such interventions are being made in the interim.”
And, talking about corruption, especially in the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, it is over six months since the pioneer minister of the ministry in this administration, Betta Edu, has been suspended, for allegedly diverting ₦585 million in ministry funds to a personal bank account. By now, whatever the government wants to do with her should have been clear: did she pass the integrity test or did she not? This is the simple answer needed in the circumstance. It shouldn’t take eternity to resolve. Let’s bring a closure to the matter by either appointing a replacement for her or recalling her so she can continue the good works she was doing before her detractors threw spanner in her works.
BusinessDay reported an angle that really interests me as a possible way out of the situation. The paper said the Federal Government has concluded plans to sell a 50kg bag of rice at N40,000 to public servants, with a view to alleviating the food crisis in the nation and its effects on Nigerians. The newspaper said it got wind of this in a letter seen by it, from the Federal Ministry of Special Duties and Inter-governmental Affairs. According to the paper, all interested staff members are to complete a Google form on the Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (OHCSF) website and submit it to the director of human resources for endorsement. For the purposes of transparency, payment for and distribution of the rice will be coordinated by designated offices while the chairman, Joint Union Council of the ministry, would serve as an observer in the course of the exercise.
I had always suggested a scheme like this; where several people would be taken off the market in search of an essential commodity like rice. May be this arrangement could be extended to some private companies too. One 50kg bag of rice should last a family of four for about four months or more. The idea is to reduce the number of people who would be going to the market to buy rice, thus forcing down the price somewhat.
You will agree with me that these are good arrangements and attempts to reduce the pangs of hunger in the land. But that obviously is elsewhere. Not Nigeria, with its endemic corruption. Unfortunately, the corruption is fuelled by lack of a good record-keeping system.
Of course, there is no country where we do not have people that would always want to shortchange the system. The difference is in the ability to catch them, often before they commit the act or after, through an effective and efficient identification system. Corruption is behind this inability to track down criminals in Nigeria because those in charge of national identity card or number know that the system would easily identify them if there is a good record of how many we are; who we are, where we are and stuff like that. If this is available, it would be easier to identify people who might want to buy more than he or she required of these items because the computer would let the cat out of the bag if anyone tries to outsmart the system. So, the officials in charge ensure there are hitches in the system that would make subversion possible.
That we have not got this right, despite travelling over 40 years to obtain National Identity Card or National Identification Number ( (NIN) is at the root of most of the crisis of development that we are having. And we cannot blame the present government that has only been in power for a little over a year for that. The 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks (what a crook?), who tried to kill former President Donald Trump at a campaign rally was gunned down almost as soon as he committed the attempted assassination. If that had happened here, not only would he have escaped, we would still have been arguing about his identity, with the political party in power claiming that he was sent by the opposition party and vice versa. While people have to think twice in other climes before committing crimes, there is nothing of the sort here because chances of being caught are remote. Not only that, even if caught, all manner of extraneous factors would now come into play.
It is evident that we have not perfected the identification process even from certain developments in recent times. About two weeks ago, many telephone subscribers were yanked off the telephone networks over their alleged inability to get NIN or inability to link the NIN with their telephone lines. Interestingly, many of them insist they went through the process and got their NINs, a claim some of the telecoms firms denied, even as many subscribers too claimed that the telcos initially accepted their NIN only to claim later that they were not authentic and consequently blocked several lines. What this would seem to suggest is that the identification scheme too has suffered credibility problem. After 40 years, and with several billions of Naira pumped into it! So, what exactly can we do and get right? Yet, our public officials are said to be among the most travelled in the world.
The long and short of what I am saying is that there is need to recalibrate the palliative machinery. The present system is not working and this should be clear to all by now. The things are not getting to those for whom they were meant. Rather, they are essentially being cornered and diverted by politicians and their cronies. How do you explain a situation where bags of rice that are clearly tagged in the name of the Federal Government are being re-bagged by unscrupulous Nigerians, whereas they should have been offered to the needy free or at rock-bottom prices? How many of those responsible have been identified and punished for the economic sabotage? I guess the cases would have been treated as ‘family affair’ because of the people perpetrating the illegality. I suspect we might have heard the last of the Katsina State incident, given the disclosure by the governor’s PPS to the effect that the bags of rice were not diverted but merely being kept in the store for the minister.
Unless I am proved wrong, this is not the right signal about government’s seriousness to get palliatives to those who actually need them. And it is the government, particularly the Federal Government, which carries the can. Not many people remember the state governments in the equation despite their increased revenues, their closeness to the people and even despite the fact that the Federal Government had given them several palliatives to get across to the vulnerable. How the Federal Government does this is left to it.
