POVERTY, INSECURITY AND RECESSION

If you had felt too poor to have anything a criminal wants, or you are so blessed that you live in a high fence home, too high for any unauthorized person to come in, or you are so politically connected such that you even have uniform armed personnel moving about with rifles at your home gate and at your estate gate, or you feel lucky to be living in the corner of Nigeria that is unreachable to crime, those feelings are quick becoming antediluvian!

Photo: Scene from 44 minutes credit: youtube.com

The insecurity in Nigeria is spreading fast across the country like a heatwave and it is affecting everyone regardless of your socioeconomic status. 

In other words, you are no longer safe being poor. 

No one is spared!

How did we get here? 

Simple: POVERTY or "BEING POOR"

Like it or hate it, poor people are angry people. They are very frustrated and they take it on everyone, even their families. They are angry with everyone including God, lol. They respect no one, in fact, they hate everyone. 

They are daring and sometimes desperate. 

They can become dangerous, if times get tougher. 

It is not spiritual, it's normal. Everyone's primary need is "to survive" and only the "fittest" will survive.

What I'm saying is that the more Nigerians are getting poorer, the more all Nigerians and Nigeria will become insecure. Didn't we know it?

We will all suffer! 

We will not know peace when more and more people are going into poverty each day, even if the entire troops are sent out to curb insecurity. 

What was once a society divided into the rich class and the poor class, contrary to other parts of the world where "middle class" exist, is now becoming a single class of "only poor people."

Take this as a strong warning: This is extremely dangerous. 

It is so bad that for the first time, Nigerians didn't bother to argue when Global Poverty Rating named their country, "The poverty capital of the world." 

It is clear! 

If we just fold our hands and speak English, 110 million people, in a country currently home to 180 million people, will go into poverty by 2030. 

That forecast a scary recession. 

For that figure and the expected population of that time (~300 million), the number of Nigerians that would step into poverty, should nothing be done, stands very close to fifty percent of the entire population.

I call that "mass poverty" that spells Armageddon!

The fight against insecurity is not usually a military warfare, it is usually a fight against Poverty. 

And Poverty is simply being poor. 

It is being hungry and not being able to eat. It is being naked and not being able to cloth. It is being burned by the sun's heat and not being able to shelter. It is being sick and not being able to get medical attention. 

I still totally agree with those who say poverty is a thing of the mind, but without food, clothing, shelter and good health, the mind cannot think well. 

You can imagine a few fruit of a mind that is not thinking well. Corruption and crime trail such minds.

Let me say this here, poverty can make good people bad. 

If there are no jobs for people who are willing to work, the people who were once willing and are still willing to work, may likely turn into crime. 

Some who are skilled in business also would start one, but of course not everyone is talented for this!

If someone who wants to get an education which has the power to properly enlighten the human mind is denied such an important thing, his impressionable mind can be easily lured into crime. 

Someone who could have contributed immensely to building our country, Africa and the world. He or she could have been a business owner or working in his or her dream job. 

Because of this denial, he could become someone we spend hundreds of million to apprehend, and millions of naira of tax payers money to feed in jail. 

Who's the loser? 

Not everyone will own a home, not everyone will own a car and not everyone will own a private jet, but everyone MUST eat and this, everyone will make sure, in any way possible. 

When a man is employed or in a successful business that can provide an average life for his family, he will be less likely to go into crime, raising the insecurity of other countrymen and women. 

I have once tweeted "To fight corruption and create a corrupt free nation, we must create an environment where people cannot be corrupt". 

Jobs, education, vocation, etc. 

In the Nigeria we currently live, everyone is robbed, everyone is kidnapped, even those who can't afford to pay any ransom and anyone can be killed. 

The south west where the economic capital domicile which was once described as economically and politically stable has in recent times had its fair share of crime ranging from armed robbery, kidnapping, murder, just to name a few. 

As a quick reminder, this is where the head quarters of most large businesses fueling our nation's economy are, alongside the people, locals and internationals, that run these businesses.

The odd reality is that doing business in any region of the world is not a do-or-die. 

If investors are no longer safe or feel safe in a place, they will move elsewhere where they feel safe and many other countries have created this enabling environment. Especially those ones who understand that with businesses comes jobs, money and development.

In a tensed environment or atmosphere most investors may want to reconsider their investments and If their reconsideration favours "Nay" more that "Aai" they'd take their businesses, jobs and development to where they feel safe enough to operate. 

Now, the man who once had a job or who could have been employed by the business that no longer feel safe here and the business that could have been here respectively will both be out of jobs. 

The effect of this business or economic migration due to insecurity created by poverty on the country will be loss of so much money in investments. This will minimize the country's ability to fund its education, health care, security, energy and other economic necessities.

In English language, this is is called "Recession"

Let me say it on this closing note, that if the government is fighting insecurity, and not fighting poverty, it is fighting the wrong enemy. 

A poor policeman and a soldier whose kids have been kicked out from school can easily be pushed into the crime they swore to fight, sad but true!

The solution is to leave the era of "single-stomached polititics" and think beyond our immediate self. 

If we don't fix it when we can, when it gets out of hands, no one and nothing will be spared. 

Lets start to think about our children's children. Let our collective future start to matter to us all, especially those who have been vested with the power to decide for everyone else and use our national wealth in ways that should benefit us all. 

Lets educate all Nigerians, Nigeria cannot afford to have 13.5 million young people out of school, financially and otherwise. 

We must run after these potential political and business leaders and take them back to school, if we truly want to address insecurity. 

We must follow the China footstep and EDUCATE EVERYONE and also follow the Canada footstep and EMPLOY EVERYONE. 

Let us harness the rich human resources deposited in the Nigerian people by providing an environment where it will be impossible for a Nigerian child, man or woman to die without expressing their dreams and full potentials. 

Let us cease to look at CRUDE OIL as more valuable than the NIGERIAN PEOPLE, because our true wealth is not OUR OIL, our true wealth is OUR PEOPLE. 

Good afternoon worldwide. 

God bless Nigeria, Africa and the world.