…Atiku said, “What Nigerians are witnessing today is the tragic normalisation of poverty under the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
ABUJA, NIGERIA- The iNews Times| Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has condemned what he described as the weaponisation of hunger and poverty through the distribution of food items in Northern Nigeria.
His spokesperson, Phrank Shaibu, made this known in a statement issued on Friday, Workers’ Day.
He criticised the recent exercise involving the First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu, who flagged off the distribution of 100 trucks of rice and N1.2 billion in palliatives to northern states and the Federal Capital Territory, describing it as a calculated political performance staged amid widespread hardship.
Atiku said, “What Nigerians are witnessing today is the tragic normalisation of poverty under the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Families can no longer afford basic meals, inflation has ravaged household incomes, and millions are being pushed daily into extreme deprivation.
“Yet, instead of addressing the structural causes of this crisis, the government has chosen the path of optics, distributing food in carefully choreographed ceremonies while the underlying suffering deepens.
“Since 2023, Northern farmers have suffered declining productivity due to the Tinubu administration’s policy failures and its inability to secure farmlands. Vast agricultural belts have been abandoned to insecurity, leaving farmers displaced and food supply chains severely weakened.
“Ironically, the same government and its promoters now seek to exploit the resulting hardship by turning food into a campaign tool. What the North truly needs is genuine, sustainable food security policies, not campaign lunch packs wrapped in party insignia.
“It is even more troubling that this pattern did not begin today. During Ramadan last year, the president’s son, Seyi Tinubu, embarked on a widely publicised distribution of food items across parts of the North, an exercise presented as charity but, according to Atiku, designed to test what has now become a strategy of politicising hunger. What began as an experiment, he said, has evolved into a full-blown policy of optics over substance.
“Let it be said without equivocation: Nigerians are not beggars to be pacified with periodic handouts while their livelihoods collapse.”
Recall that Nigeria’s First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu, on Thursday unveiled an initiative to distribute N1.2 billion worth of rice as palliative to Nigerians.
