Congress, Alhaji Lai Mohammed spoke on Thursday during
his 9th Ramadan Lecture in Oro, Kwara State about how the
administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has
the solution to tackle Nigeria’s developmental challenges.
He said that Nigeria has a lot of challenges in many sectors
especially in areas of health, poverty, education and
unemployment.
He said Buhari’s administration had worked out immediate
and long term measures to deal with the challenges in all
critical sectors.
He said Buhari’s government would solve the problems ‘even
in the face of paucity of funds.
According to him, the scarcity of funds was caused by the
fall in the price of crude oil, which Nigeria depended on for
most of its foreign exchange revenue.
He added that the paucity of funds was caused by the
alleged “unbridled and maddening corruption that has seen
public officers ferreting away public funds.”
Mohammed said,
“I have deliberately taken us through the grim statistics in
the very key areas of health, education, poverty and
unemployment to drive home the point that we are in
trouble, as a nation, if we don’t act in a deliberate, concerted
and determined way to turn things around for the better.”
He said that while Nigerians had made history by voting for
the APC to take over the reins of power from a ruling party,
the Peoples Democratic Party, that held sway for 16 years,
they must now follow up by ensuring that the process of
change – which they brought about – came into fruition.
According to him, the best way to do it is for Nigerians to
remain politically-aware and engaged as they were in the
run-up to the elections.
“That simply means they must be willing to defend the
change they voted for by continuing to support the
government of President Muhammadu Buhari, while
preventing the reactionary forces, who never wanted or
voted for change anyway, from sabotaging his party’s
change mantra. Whatever is worth fighting for is worth
defending.
“I say this with all sense of responsibility, and against the
stark realities that we face daunting challenges in all sectors.
Never before has our nation been put in a situation where it
virtually had to start rebuilding from the scratch, after almost
all sectors have become nearly comatose. This is why it is
necessary for the new government at the centre to make
haste slowly, and get it right once and for all.
“Whereas we face huge problems in the economic and
security sectors, as well as in the area of infrastructural
renewal, just to mention a few, let us restrict ourselves to
the social issues alone for the purpose of these remarks.”
According to him, Nigeria’s health statistics are worse than
the average for African countries, even though Nigeria claims
to be the giant of Africa.
He said 128 children were dying in every 1000 live births as
of 2013 while mortality from malaria was estimated at 1,157
deaths per 100,000 population.
He added that tuberculosis was estimated at five deaths per
100,000 population in 2013.
He stated that “about 900,000 children and mothers die each
year in Nigeria, accounting for 14 per cent of all maternal
and 13 per cent of all under-5 deaths globally, and second
only to India.”
According to him, at 576 deaths per 100,000 live births, the
maternal mortality ratio has remained static since 2008.
He stated that although child mortality is falling, progress is
insufficient to reach the MDG targets.
Mohammed also said that “an increasing proportion of child
deaths, that is 37 per cent, occurs during the first month of
life from largely preventable causes which are complications
during birth, infection and complications of premature
births.”
He added that malnutrition remained a significant challenge,
contributing to 35 per cent of deaths in children under-5
years in Nigeria.
“The proportion of underweight – children who have low
weight for their age- increased by 21% between 2003 and
2013, and the proportion of children with wasting, that is low
weight for height, increased by 64% during the same period.
“Overall, socio-economic and geographical inequalities in
health outcomes and access to healthcare are stark and
increasing, with the poor and rural having worst outcomes.
“In the area of immunisation, Nigeria is still one of the three
remaining polio-endemic countries, together with Pakistan
and Afghanistan. In addition, Nigeria has the world’s largest
burden of HIV-positive newborns, with more than 50,000
children born with positive status each year.”
He also said Nigeria’s education system should prepare the
children for the responsibilities of citizenship and prepare the
youths to contribute to the development of the country.
He stated that unfortunately the current system was failing
to equip Nigeria’s children with the knowledge and skills
they needed to thrive in today’s rapidly changing society and
economy.
According to him,the current situation of education in Nigeria
depicts large numbers of children, that is 10.5 million,
remain out of school.
He added that children from poorer households, rural areas
and females were more likely not to be in school.
Primary school attendance is 44 % in the northeast
compared to 81 % in the southeast. Even when children are
in school, a large proportion are not learning.
According to him nearly half of all children who have
completed primary school cannot read a complete sentence.
Mohammed also said that a large proportion of Nigerian
population live very close to the poverty line and are highly
vulnerable to small variations of income.
He stated that since 2003, Nigeria had recorded strong
economic growth, with real Gross Domestic Product growth
averaging seven per cent.
He added that however, in the same period, poverty rate had
only declined slightly from about 48.4% in 2003 to 46 % in
2010.
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