*FG’s INSISTENCE TO FEED OUR CHILDREN IN THEIR HOMES*
I was one of the Nigerians who thought that Mr President made a huge mistake when in paragraph 50 of his first address to the nation on Covid-19, he directed a ministry to work with the relevant state governments in developing a strategy on how to sustain the school feeding programme. Little did we know that something was up the sleeves of this administration.
The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, Sadiya Farouq, few days ago followed up on Mr President’s directives and said the school feeding programme will be implemented despite the closure of schools nationwide.
Many had wondered how this could be implemented with the pupils currently at home after schools had been locked down.
The minister didn’t provide any clarification to this ambiguity but disclosed that the Federal Government was spending hundreds of millions of naira daily on the programme.
According to her “it is a lot of money because we are targeting 3.1 million households all over the country.”
The question that quickly agitates the mind is where the government got the data used to generate the 3.1 million households.
The way and manner the federal government is humping the school feeding programme is unsmart and laughable.
How can you explain to Nigerians that you want to feed pupils when all schools are under lock and key.
If the government is looking for ways of looting the treasury and the only way possible at this time is to use our children as bait and decoy, why can’t they just put a new name to it! The insistence of this administration to feed pupils who are in their parents homes is abusing the sensibilities and intelligence of Nigerians.
I get worried if there are no longer smart thinkers in this government again who can advice it when it is going off target.
Where are people like VP Yemi Osinbajo, Babatunde Fashola, Godwin Emefiele, Festus Keyamo, Adeniyi Adebayo, Abubakar Mallami, Adeleke Mamora , Ikechukwu Ogah and Femi Ojudu to mention but a few.
Nigeria has often been described as possessing potentials to become one of the most developed in the world due to its enormous endowments of resources, both human and natural. Unfortunately, in Nigeria’s version of the petro-capitalism, like in Iranian counterpart under its perverse ruler, Shah, a disproportionately large proportion of those earnings – about 80% – over decades, has been stolen by the elite which constitutes less than one per cent of the total population.
Public treasury looting and corruption by Nigeria’s elite poses diverse adversities on the society and economy.
The main point in relation to treasury looting is that it represents lost opportunities for financing public welfare-raising infrastructure development or employment projects.
The bases for relating treasury looting and corruption perpetrated by the elite to public welfare is founded on the way the former manifests through spurious programmes like school feeding.
One of the most direct repercussions of treasury looting and corruption is the way they provoke frustration of those deprived of their public entitlement.
It is an irony that of all oil producing nations, Nigeria is the only country with the history of crude oil thefts.
And when oil theft is no longer fashionable, the use of school feeding has become the new kid on the block. Relegation of public interest, readiness to cheat, grabbing, philistinism inclinations are the only game in town; all boil down to corruption accessioned by leadership deficit and bad governance in the country.
There is lack of critical mass of men and women of integrity willing to harness and unleash the various resources in the country for the common good or public interest.
The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership. There is nothing with the Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else.
The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to its responsibility, to the challenge of personal example which is the hallmarks of true leadership.
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