IN the last two weeks or thereabouts, I have been one very angry Nigerian. I don’t know whether there are others like me who are angry. If there are, I do not know how many of us are angry. I also don’t know where the other angry Nigerians are, apart from those who vent their anger by posting on social media platforms like Facebook, or in video skits in Facebook Reels or on Tik-Tok..All I know is that I have been angry for a long time, even in my sleep, because I often wake up angry.
What exactly gets me angry?
Many things. To start with, the cost of living, which is forever rising. Every day, one thousand naira, (N1,000) buys less and less of what it used to buy in hundreds before. Ever since N1,000 can no longer buy a litre of petrol, many Nigerians like me have stopped using their generators. Buying 10 litres of petrol to light the home for just two evenings has become an uphill task. It is an undertaking that is becoming harder and harder to finance. I remember the days of the Katsina general, the taciturn Muhammadu Buhari as President. Petrol was N187 per litre, and N1,000 could buy a little more than five(5) litres. Before him was the allegedly clueless Dr. Jonathan. In his time, petrol sold for N97. N1,000 bought a little more than 10 litres. Still, there was another Katsina politician, the late Umaru Musa Yar’Adua. Under him, petrol was N65. N1,000 bought a little more than 15 litres. You can also check the prices of commodities like foodstuffs and tokunbo cars under each of these presidents and compare how life and living was in their time against what it is now.
Before February, petrol was selling between N743 and N850, depending on where you are. We were all struggling with that. Then, US and Israel happened on Iran, and a conflict ensued which affected and still affects shipping of crude oil from the oilfields of the Middle East countries to refiners elsewhere in the world. The snag is that at least, about 20% of the world’s crude shipments pass through the Strait of Hormuz, controlled by Iran. As a result, ships diverted to longer routes, making landing costs of crude higher for refiners. That, in short explains why petrol price left the N700-850 belt and started selling above N1,000. Today, I bought, on my way to work, at N1,115 per litre.
What got me angrier was that since the conflict in the Middle East impacted fuel energy prices worldwide, no less than 60 countries have implemented about 200 different policies to cushion the impact of the higher prices on their citizens, and by extension, on their economy. Yet, our government has not announced any plan to make our burden lighter. All the rhetoric we got to justify removal of subsidy has turned out to be gas. Our schools remain what they are, bereft of well-trained teachers and learning aids, hospitals remain without doctors and drugs, electricity supply remains as epileptic as ever, while insecurity just keeps getting worse. Just days after the 46 Oyo schoolchildren regained freedom, kidnappers struck in Kogi State, abducting students writing examinations, a NECO official, as well as the school principal. As we speak, kidnap victims in Borno, Benue, Kwara and other parts of the country have remained in captivity.
Just before I left home, my wife informed that there is no rice left in the pantry. I asked how much would be needed to restock, and she told me that we’d need no less than N65,000 for a bag, and if that amount wasn’t available, maybe we could do half bag. I sighed in frustration. When last we bought a bag, around February, it was N52,000. Between then and now, there’s been a N13,000 increase.
Leaving home for work, I wended my way through the usual Lagos traffic, and was hobbled by frustrating traffic jams no less than four times between Igando and the Airport Road to connect Apapa-Oshodi Expressway. Cause? Potholes that had become huge craters as a result of endless rains make motorists slow down and negotiate around them. In the traffic, one got assailed by terrible odours from garbage heaps on the road medians. For months now, garbage collection has taken a rear seat in Lagos. It seems as if the governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, and his men in charge of the environment and LAWMA have taken exit visas from the state.
Speaking of floods, Nigeria was not the only country affected. Floods from torrential rains have wreaked havoc in many countries like Ghana, DR Congo, Gabon and others. We are not alone. Where we are on our own is in the response of government to it, or lack of response. There are videos on the internet of the President of Ghana, John Dramani Mahama, flying in a helicopter for a view of the damage floods wreaked in Accra. After that, he mandated his Minister of Finance to get a tally of those affected by the floods, and authorised disbursement of 300 million Ghanaian cedis as palliatives for them.
When I see or read of such interventions, I just get angry. But I have a feeling that my anger is an impotent one. For one, everywhere I turn, I see fellow countrymen suffering from the Stockholm Syndrome. Our people are hailing those who are making life tougher and tougher for them, daily. As more roads get washed away or crack up during this season of rains, those of who drive will have to visit the mechanic more often than before. Now that petrol prices have resumed the upward climb, and the president is not looking in that direction, we are on our own. And I keep asking, just what is government doing for us, beacuse they keep telling us to endure for a better tomorrow while they live in luxury, today. even basic things, we are not getting! People, any answers? TGIF.
