By Anietie Akpan
As Nigeria marks June 12 as Democracy Day, the Take It Back Movement has called for a mass troop out for a peaceful march tomorrow to say #EndHardshipInNigeria.
A statement on Wednesday by the South South Coordinator, “Take It Back Movement”, Jonathan Ugbal, said the peaceful protest will start by 8:00am at the Mary Slessor Roundabout and “we invite our brothers and sisters in the law enforcement agencies and the military – who are also victims of this terrible situation we are in, to join us”.
The movement listed some of the numerous challenges facing Nigerians, saying “we all, are grappling with the terrible hardship sweeping round the country.
“We are grappling with a food insecurity crisis that sees more than 100 million Nigerians suffering from that. The government itself has said more than 100 million Nigerians are living in multidimensional poverty, the truth is that, the figure is in reality, higher. More than 49 percent of Nigerians earning between 30,000 and 50,000 spend their entire earnings on food and often rely on loans and aid to even commute to work”.
“Unemployment has soared as many micro, small, and medium scale businesses have either retrenched, cut back on production and services or shut down due to high energy costs and a terrible business environment leading to increased unemployment”, the Movement said adding that “the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics in its controversial review of the modus in collating employment statistics did say that while the figures dropped, no new jobs had been added. What the NBS did not say was that more jobs were lost and the number of underemployed Nigerians ballooned!
“Transportation costs have further increased too due to the shocking and inhumane (partial) removal of subsidy on fuel which despite putting more resources in the coffers of government, has not led to real impact in the stomachs and well-being of Nigerians”.
The Movement further argued that the trickle down economics of the current administration “is clearly a neo liberal agenda of the feudalist capitalist system and the petty bourgeoisie class that populates leadership roles in our political, cultural, religious, academic, and lifestyle circles. A growing GDP per capita with a hungry, starving, insecure, unwell, and dying populace is downright unacceptable!
“In 26 years and 13 day so far since the advent of the fourth democratic republic, we have seen, an increase in the use of law enforcement agents to oppress dissent, silence critics, and crackdown on those seeking accountability, and transparency – a civic right and responsibility. This must be vehemently resisted.
“We are our own solution. We are a democracy. But, we are seeing the demonstration of craze (apologies to Fela) from a few who are privileged to lead us and we must collectively rise up on the day set aside to celebrate that democracy and say, enough is enough! We can March forward as a people without being subjected to the torture and dehumanizing situation we find ourselves in”.
