In a new editorial published on Sunday, Bloomberg, a NewYork-based news firm, stated that Nigeria currently houses more poor individuals than two former poorest nations in the world.
Although the report explained that fast growth in the economy would help to solve the emerging crisis, there was a question of whether the current president, Muhammadu Buhari “is up to the task”.
The skepticism attached to the president’s ability to turn things around is based on the firm’s conclusion that Buhari’s performance in his first tenure was discouraging.
In the editorial, Bloomberg explained that the major concerns of countries all over the world in the last two decades have been on ways to reduce poverty rates. As a matter of fact, there were over 1.4 billion humans living in extreme poverty as in the year 2000.
However, Bloomberg stated, “Today, the number is about 600 million. This remarkable change is mainly due to growth in China and India. Much of sub-Saharan Africa, particularly Nigeria, has failed to share in the success.”
“A decade ago, Nigeria had far fewer people in extreme poverty than either China or India; today, according to data compiled by the World Data Lab, it has more than both combined. The count stands at more than 90 million, and has risen both in absolute terms and as a share of the total.”
The editorial further highlighted that Nigeria’s population is likely to have been doubled by the year 2050 and even though there is a reduction in the current growth rate of poverty, the number of poor Nigerians would still be alarming in the future.
“Even assuming that the proportion of Nigerians living in extreme poverty stops rising as quickly as it has in recent years, it’s on course to remain extraordinarily high for the foreseeable future.
“Nigeria’s success or failure in confronting extreme poverty will be pivotal for the rest of Africa, too — partly because of its huge population but also because of its outsize influence over its neighbours. The government led by President Muhammadu Buhari, recently re-elected to a second and final four-year term, bears a grave responsibility,” it stated.
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