President Bola Ahmed Tinubu ran for office on a “Renewed Hope” electoral platform. But since his first day in office, it has been suffering for the working people and poor masses in Nigeria. Hunger and hardship have been our lot. We have not taken this lying down.
Several times in 2024, we took to the streets to protest. In several industries and sectors, our trade unions had to embark on strikes.
While we made our anger visible with demands to stop the hardship and end the bad governance of the ruling class which puts us in this state of economic and social despair, the Tinubu-led APC regime did not stop implementing neoliberal reforms that make life worse for we, the poor working-class people and youth.
To rub salt on our open wounds, the regime and its apologists say the reforms are working and will yield positive results this year. But these claims are false. Hunger is still killing the poor. 2024 ended with headline inflation standing at 34.6%, the highest in 28 years. And food inflation was over 40%. The federal government’s projection to reduce the inflation rate to 15% in 2025 is laughable.
Even the World Bank and IMF, who keep on cheering President Tinubu because he is doing exactly what they want him to do for the benefit of global capitalism, have said this is impossible. However, even the 25% rate they hope will be achieved is also a farfetched dream.
The Abuja Catholic Archbishop Ignatius Kaigama, has asked President Tinubu to match his message of hope with action and make sure that he drives the inflation rate down to 15%. But this aim is not achievable, nor will its pursuit lead to improvement in the lives of the people.
The contractionary monetary policies that the government has already taken have only increased the cost of living for Nigerians because it is a cost inflation and not one sparked by demand-pull. For example, the raising of interest rate from 15.5% to 27.25% between October 2023 and September 2024 has led to further increases in the costs of consumer goods. Producers passed it on to working-class people.
It is instructive that the Archbishop Kaigama expressed his wish during a service for victims of one of the stampedes last December where poor Nigerians were killed as they tried to get food. Altogether, 67 people died at Ibadan in the Southwest, Anambra in the Southeast and Abuja the Federal Capital Territory. Thirty-five of them were children at Ibadan. These stampedes highlight the deepening economic crisis destroying the livelihoods and lives of working-class people whose sweat and toil create the wealth that a few rich people feed fat upon.
A month’s minimum wage cannot buy a bag of rice. Several families now eat only once or twice a day. Many people trek for at least a part of the distance to their workplace in major cities, because they cannot afford transport fare. Nigeria has become “the country with the highest number of homeless people in the world”.
The neoliberal policies of the government have not worked for us, the common people. But the government has committed itself to consolidate them in 2025 with its so-called budget of restoration. Tinubu and his disciples want to restore profitability for the capitalists and renew unending suffering for workers, poor farmers, artisans and traders, working-class women, and youth.
The problem for poor people in Nigeria has not simply been lack of economic growth. It is because only a few people, the capitalists and other large property-owners like big landlords, benefit from such growth. There is no redistribution of wealth. Rather, our poverty is the secret behind their riches. And we cannot stop this without our fighting to liberate ourselves and abolish poverty.
The time to fight till we win is now. Our very lives are on the line. In our workplaces, communities, schools and neighbourhoods, we must not simply agonise. We must organise. In 2024, we showed that we can unite and fight. But those were rehearsals for what we have to do now. For us to stop the renewed suffering that the APC regime of Tinubu and the capitalist ruling class have lined up for us, we must rise up in our numbers.
Dare to struggle, dare to win!
Editorial BOARD
