Bayo Onanuga, managing director (MD) of the News Agency of Nigeria, sparked public outrage on Tuesday when he suggested that the media was hyping – or “over-sensationalising” – economic hardship under President Muhammadu Buhari.
In his opinion, an objective reality check is needed to reveal the true state of things in the country.
He said his daughter took a flight from Lagos to London and the flight was full, which made him “wonder whether all the seeming orchestrated campaign in the media was not mere propaganda to make the Buhari regime look really bad”.
“I was in Bauchi and Jos at the weekend, I also found that food was cheap everywhere. In our hotel, we paid about N700 for a plate of semovita, or eba with a choice of cat fish or chicken.
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“On the roadside, I found to my surprise that with just N1000, I bought over 50 oranges, two giant water melon and 10 pieces of sweet potato. I had experienced a similar thing in the market at Abuja, where I found that with N1,400, I could make a big vegetable soup, with tomato, pepper and roasted Titus fish.”
But Onanuga was greeted with heavy criticism on Facebook and Twitter, and he attempted a clarification, writing: “I need to make myself crystal clear to all those who have responded, some with vulgar abuse, some with disparaging remarks, to my statement on Facebook on the situation in my country,” he wrote.
“First is that many people demonstrated in their reactions that they did not understand what I wrote. They simply read my statement upside down or ill-digested it.
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“Several points I raised were mere hypotheses, mere suppositions, not conclusions. I asked: is it true? Have we been exaggerating our economic conditions? Can the media conduct some reality check?”
He acknowledged that there was some hardship in the land, adding that “even Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote has had his wealth vastly reduced by the economic crisis”.
Onanuga argued that he had not be influenced by his government appointment, saying: “I have spent the past 36 years, post-graduation, defending the cause of the Nigerian people. Contrary to some opinions, my view is not influenced by my official position.”
In the past year, the naira has moved from about 210/$1 to 425/$1 at the parallel market. The pump price of petrol has gone from N87 per litre to N145 per litre; inflation has jumped from 9 percent to 17.1 percent.
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A bag of rice has moved from about N10,000 to N20,000; Kerosene, the masses’ liquid, has more than doubled in price. United Airlines, Siberia, Aero Contractors, FirstNation, no longer fly in our skies due to “hostile economic environment”.
Also in the past one year, Nigeria has passed its biggest budget (in naira terms), electricity had also peaked at over 5,000 megawatts. Insurgency in the northeast has been reduced drastically; billions of naira looted in the past have been recovered. The war against corruption is ongoing with some results.
But if airports are ever-busy, local and international flights are filled up, and hotel bookings are rising, is there possibly a chance that Onanuga is right?
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1 comments
The press is reporting what they are seeing. Onanuga did not go to the right places to check hardship.
1. Go to the markets, the common man cannot afford to go to the market to buy things. The common man has no money because those who are working have not been paid salaries for months, the others have no work because their places of work have closed down like Aero contractor airline.
2. The common man travels in buses, okada, etc they have no money to fly on local routes. They have no business going overseas like Onanuga’s daughter, because he either has no work or salary was not paid.
3. The little money at hand cannot go round. They cannot afford to eat at mama put that cost less than N700 a meal. Remember that minimum wage is N18,000. A man with two children (average Nigerians have 4 children) cannot spend N2,800 for one meal. He will need the meal 3 times a day and at least 30 times a month. N18,000 Naira cannot cover that.
4. With people out of work, those working are not being paid when due, prices are going up (rice up from N10,000 to N22,000, Electricity went up by about 45%, energy used are still being estimated {meters are not provided and not been read when provided}, petrol up from N87 to N145 etc). The situation must be very difficult for the common man.
The President is not to blame for everything. The rice of crude dropped from $110 to $40 per barrel. The production dropped from 2.2mb/d to less than 1.5mb/d. He cannot urinate crude oil neither can he sell the little being produce at a none existent market. We had also that the treasury was empty when he took over the office.
Onanuga should go and do more walk about at the places when common man live. I know he and his daughter are not one of us.