The Arewa Consultative Forum, ACF, has noted with concern that Nigeria, and especially the Northern region retains the unenviable status of “poverty capital of the world”, where living challenges have become entrenched.....KINDLY READ THE FULL STORY HERE▶

While congratulating the Nigerian and worldwide Muslim Ummah as they celebrate the 1447AH Eid-il-Fitr, the forum noted that generalised dire economic hardships have belied official claims about conditions getting better, adding that multidimensional poverty and associated forms of socioeconomic and political deprivations have remained the lot of an overwhelming proportion of citizens.

The forum said the year’s Holy Month, an otherwise a period of fervent worship, spiritual reflections, sacrifice and benevolent gestures to fellow humans, has been observed amid existential challenges and downward spiral in living conditions.

A statement issued by the forum’s National Publicity Secretary, Prof. Muhammad-Baba said, “All three geo-political regions in the North face daunting, as if to signal an inexorable slide into dystopia. The Northcentral zone has been under siege as armed non-state actors continue to disturb the peace of the people in Benue, Niger, Plateau, Kogi and Kwara states. States in the Northwest, the epicentre of banditry, have remained under the vice grip of bloodthirsty criminals euphemistically labelled “bandits” as if to perversely rationalise their dark criminal enterprise.”

In the Northeast, the forum noted that religious extremists appear poised to resurface with their quixotic search for a putative utopia and further illustrating Nigeria’s downward spiral, are the unprovoked heinous attacks by ragtag non-state actors on military outposts as recently recorded in Borno and Plateau states.

It explained that the existential cauldron of challenges is deep, wide, cascading and spiralling out of control and adding to the challenges are outcries, from the so-called opposition parties and individuals, against extra-judicial arrests and prolonged, unconstitutional detention and other strongarm tactics, by the political authorities and their agencies, against widely accepted universal principles and practices of democracy.

According to Muhammad-Baba, “In short, the general situation of the people is of despair, hopelessness and despondency, such that the Ramadan fast as well as, coincidently, Lent, was observed attests to the peoples’ resilience and never-say-die spirits.

“Still, the political authorities must not take this situation for granted. Should conditions continue to deteriorate, the political authorities risk the peoples’ wrath and protests.”

He stated that ACF believed that the Nigerian condition is not insurmountable as much could be achieved through the entrenchment of the principles of good governance in public policy formulation and implementation, in place of the current surreal obsession with political campaigns for re-election against in 2027.

ACF urged the people to remain patient and steadfast in prayers for a better Nigeria, saying that nothing in existential conditions lasts forever and called on politicians aspiring to run for political offices in the 2027 elections to imbibe edifying values and principles of prudence, restrain and introspection as these values relate to their responsibilities to the electorate.

It then called for continuing unalloyed support for the security agents to decimate criminals and criminality in Nigeria.