Only the opposition would say that it was not warned about how President Bola Ahmed Tinubu planned to tackle the problems of Nigeria. Our president is a man of his words. Such men are scarce on the political horizon. Even before the first sore thumbprint had dried on the ballot paper, President Tinubu promised that he would remove the so-called petroleum subsidy and that the heavens would not fall. Of course, we know that the carpet covering our heads does not fall because we wish it did, if it does, heaven knows how many irreparable holes we would all have created on the ozone layer.
Like a good man that is ensnared by his promise, the president announced the withdrawal of petroleum subsidy. The heavens did not fall, but the earthly part of the world called Nigeria obeyed Murphy’s law. To those of you wondering what that is, it states that anything that can go wrong will go wrong.
Contrary to popular wisdom, subsidy is not the palliathief that reduces the supply of oxygen to the poor. No. Instead, it is the hyperbaric oxygen chamber that renews the feeling of life for the privileged cabal. To target subsidy is not to make the president, governor, minister or other office reduce the number of cars on their convoy, it is to reduce the number of silly people whose ultimate ambition is to drive a tokunbo. It is done to place people in their correct social class while empowering those that hold the Nigerian economy by the balls.
Little wonder that no sooner had the phantom subsidy been removed that the Nigerian economy went on an irreversible tail spin. Achebe saw it coming when he wrote Things Fall Apart because once you take out subsidy the falcon would no longer be able to decode the signal from the falconer. The first casualty was the naira that slid into a coma against other currencies, including the CFA.
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When the dollar collapses, it takes meaning off the prices of essential goods because we all know that even the fuel we have in abundance, we do not produce. And since nature abhors vacuum, we cannot shut down the economy until 2025 when Dangote Refinery is expected to fully come on stream. Nor could we wait to see if Tinubu has the magic wand to make Nigeria’s non-functioning refineries start producing again. Buhari had promised to revamp those refineries and build four others, but the cabal must have advised him against it and he abandoned the plan.
Our president is not like Buhari. He foresaw what would happen when chaos happens and had a plan. In a celebrated video clip, one of the few where he was allowed to speak without the cancelling sound of KWAM 1’s music, he had promised grains to the rescue. He proposed to feed Nigeria’s teeming youths with agbado and ewa – maize and beans. In Kwara Polytechnic of the 80’s it was called ‘quantity’ and because it was the known starvation diet of prisoners, it was not a popular meal at the buttery. Nigeria has come a long way. Today, it no longer has prisons, it has correctional centres. If you like, Tinubu’s grains may be correctional food, after all most Nigerians live in prisons. If you doubt me, check the steel grid on your window sill.
Tinubu is not a farmer. Indeed, there’s not much land left in Lagos to experiment on farming. But not to worry, his predecessor, Muhammadu Buhari commissioned rice pyramids. Last week, Tinubu opened the pyramids and the strategic grain reserves. He sent five (5) trailer loads of rice to each of Nigeria’s 36 states, not forgetting Abuja. Believing that those who get the grains might need money to buy condiments to turn the rice into a meal, he also released N5 billion to the states to finally bury poverty. In July, the president had ordered the release of grains.
If you rode a horse in the belly of his supporters, you would be galloping without hitting any potholes. A state like Kwara did not waste time distributing the grains. A video clip from the distribution centre shows there is no difference between the distribution centre and feeding time at any large chicken farm. It was a miracle that nobody was stomped in the stampede. States like Osun are in deep trouble. Being an opposition state, dancing Governor Adeleke is still wondering how to distribute five trucks of rice to 30 local government areas.
By the time this distribution process is completed, even Jesus Christ would be shocked. He fed 5,000 with five loaves and two fishes. Tinubu is working on feeding whole families with one grain of rice, not just for a miserly day, but until the naira regains its strength and the refineries supply enough fuel to beat down the prices of everything that has gone up. The snag is – in Nigeria, only the age of civil servants goes down close to their retirement. Anything else that goes up in Nigeria does not obey the law of gravity.
As it stands, Nigerians would have to wear garter belts made of steel to stave off hunger and starvation. While they are doing that, Tinubu swore in 45 ministers whose portfolios have been assigned and reassigned. For, just as the new ministers were distributing flight tickets to their families to come and witness their invitation to join the privileged class, the president reassigned their portfolios. Tinubu is fairer than his predecessor, he is not asking his ministers to reduce their salaries or allowances – they need the full thing for energy to do work.
While all this is going on, Nigeria’s parliamentarians are on their well-earned recess, with a rumoured N2 million ‘tokens’ in their accounts according to Senator Abdul Ningi who was not happy that his own token was taking too long to land in his bank account. When they return, they’d be dumping their personal cars for brand new ones very unlikely to come from Innoson Motors. Because all animals are not equal, principal officers would be getting N5 billion bulletproof cars. Now, this is how to distinguish honourable assemblymen and women from those they represent.
The people are tightening their belts so that their representatives could lengthen theirs. Our parliamentarians want protection against assassination while the people they represent want protection from hunger.
Nigerians, being very religious people, are hoping that the presidential grains they get would transform into eternal bukas or canteens in their bellies. That is the expected miracle of the grains of Renewed Hope; those who eat therefrom would never go hungry except of course if they are members of the opposition. They did not vote for the miracle; they should expect none. Non-Nigerians might not understand these things. Miracles are as common to us as manna was to the Israelites in the wilderness. We hope, live, breathe and dream on them. After all, we have more worship centres than China has factories, more prayer warriors than Indians have IT experts, more faith factories than Germany has autobahns, and more miracle centres than we have offices. Thus, favoured by the gods, we pray that the miracle grains protect us from rising fuel prices.