Stephen Ukandu, Umuahia
The Senate has urged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to quickly roll out measures to solve the problem of starvation and hyper inflation in the country, warning that Nigerians are losing patience over the excruciating hardship.
The Senate warned that things might get out of control if there is no quick intervention by the Federal Government as many families are already finding it hard to feed.
The Senate also warned that the patience of the people should not be taken for granted, noting that patience is elastic but its elasticity not everlasting.
The Senate noted with serious concern, the astronomical spike in the prices of commodities across the country, and the attendant poor living conditions of many Nigerians.
It called for the deployment of 60 trucks of fertilizers to each of the 36 states of the Federation with, two per Senator and one truck for each member of the House of Representatives.
The Senate resolutions followed a motion entitled, “Urgent Need to Address Food Insecurity and Market Exploitation of Consumables In Nigeria.”
It was sponsored by Senator Sunday Karimi, APC Kogi West, and co-sponsored by the Senate Chief Whip, Senator Ali Ndume, APC Borno South.
In his presentation, Senator Karimi noted that in the last few months, the price of goods and household consumables had skyrocketed, leading to a high rate of inflation, weakened buying power, and general worsening of living conditions of the vast majority of Nigerians.
According to him, ”the latest data by Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics show that food inflation in the country skyrocketed to 40.66 per cent on a year-on-year basis, a significant increase from the 24.82 per cent recorded in May 2023.”
“The Senate is aware of the current market price of food items such as beans, maize, rice paddy, yam, tomatoes, and onions which initially rose by about 40% after the removal of petroleum subsidy has now increased to over 100% to 300% without any attributable reason for the increase in prices;
“We are further aware that although insecurity in food-producing regions, bad roads, increase in the cost of transportation attributable to the removal of fuel subsidy and depreciation of the value of Naira, are possible factors that have contributed to the increase in the price of food items, household commodities, and consumables; the percentage of increase in the cost of transportation and some under factors listed above is significantly less than the percentage increase in the current prices of goods all over the country;
“Concerned that the greater percentage of the increase in prices of food items and consumables in the country is not only due to these factors but to the zest of the merchants, traders, and retailers to make supernormal profits whilst they excuse the hike in price on these factors (depreciation of the Naira against the Dollar, increase in price of Petroleum Products due to Fuel price increase and insecurity in farming Regions), thereby heaping all the blame on the Federal Government;
“Notes that there is a general attitude of “Get Rich Quickly” or “Get Rich By All Means” leading many Nigerians to jettison “being their brother’s keeper” and exploiting one another to make abnormal profits: This attitude has been justified on the basis that many members of the Political Class, Technocrats, and Corporate Elites have helped themselves with Public Funds without any repercussions in Law, Nigerian Traders have thus resorted to Price Gouging to maximize profits;
“Further notes that there are reports that Farming Communities in the Border Regions with other Countries, prefer to sell their food items abroad (to these neighbouring countries), rather than domestically(to the hinterland), thereby increasing local food insecurity; and
Concludes that all efforts made by the current Federal Executive to arrest the consistent increase in food inflation have not yielded the desired results, there is a need to be more pragmatic about addressing food insecurity, curbing herder farmer crises, kidnapping for ransom, and Terrorism, and ensure the development of a viable National Commodity Board to regulate the price of grains and ensure the elimination of artificial contributions to food and commodity inflation in Nigeria.”
Contributing, Senator Ndume who lamented that this was the first time Nigeria was listed as one of the countries battling food insecurity, said, “In their many publications, they say Nigeria is likely to experience the highest session of food insecurity globally.”
He said: “Currently, there are four countries including Sudan and some others that are facing very serious insecurity. Nigeria is added to this list this year by the International Rescue Committee as one of the spots for food insecurity action against hunger. World Food Program also indicated that over 32 million people are expected to face a critical hunger crisis and emerging levels between June and August.
“I don’t know about some other colleagues, but there in the North, we have started seeing it visibly. This is the first time we are experiencing this level of hunger. It’s the first time Nigeria is being listed as one of the countries with food insecurity.”
Contributing also, the immediate past President of the Senate, Senator Ahmad Lawan, APC Yobe North, told his colleagues that the people are really hungry in the country, warning that patience and tolerance are both elastic, but they are not eternally elastic, just as he took a swipe at the Federal Government, saying that the government has nothing in the food Reserve across the Country and that the Silos are empty.
The former Senate President said: “Let me say here that patience, and tolerance, are both elastic but they are not eternally elastic. Our students are facing real, real anger. I travelled the two states last week, in the North particularly, and I’ve seen first-hand how people, especially those who are not in the civil service, nor in any business, are suffering, fighting, and struggling to have food at least once a day.
“Under normal circumstances, Mr. President, in the rainy season, from maybe June up to September or October, when there will be harvests of new foodstuff, prices escalate prices of foodstuff. Now we don’t even have the truth. Mr. President in today’s national daily, the Executive arm of government is saying it is considering reducing or removing taxes on imported foodstuff.
”Here’s the catch. This Senate must engage the executive immediately. What are the issues? Which taxes are they talking about? Because we should be seen to be doing the right thing. We have little or nothing in our food reserve across the country. And nobody, If they come and tell us, they will distribute foodstuff from our silos, the silos are empty. So it means we have to import food. And if we have to import, it means we need foreign exchange.
“We wouldn’t like the kind of thing that we see in our streets and it is time that we take every possible action to get out of the event of the arm of government to ensure that food floods our country. The government must be entirely responsible because we cannot take people for granted for too long. We have come almost to the end of the patience. And I think the elasticity is now going to snap if we are not careful.”
Meanwhile, the President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, agreed that food insecurity was getting out of control.
