ABUJA, NIGERIA — Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has voiced his concern over what he describes as a growing crisis of hunger and poverty in Nigeria. The 2023 presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has accused the administration of President Bola Tinubu of failing to address the issue.
In a statement released by his media adviser, Paul Ibe, Mr. Abubakar claimed that there were “no manifest signs” that the current government was capable of tackling the severe hunger affecting the poor. He warned that the unchecked spread of poverty could lead to widespread social unrest, drawing parallels to historical events such as the French and Russian revolutions and the Arab Spring.
The former vice president also suggested that even Nigeria’s 2020 “ENDSARS” protests were fuelled by “traumatising frustration of hunger and insensitivity on the part of the government.” He argued that a government’s primary responsibility should be the welfare and security of its citizens, and that any reforms must have a “human face.”
“Whether the present powers accept it or not, the reality of our existence is that the poor are increasingly dying of hunger while the majority of the living poor exists at the mercy of the ill-advised policies of this government,” the statement read.
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