Politicians Cannot Think About Poor People – Osita Chidoka

A former Minister of Aviation, Osita Chidoka, has said the political elites do not think about the masses because they separate themselves from the daily realities of the citizens.

Chidoka said Nigeria’s problem may continue to exist until the electoral processes are gotten right. He decried the corruption that marred the off-cycle elections across the country.

In an interview with Arise News on Saturday, Chidoka condemned election rigging by the political class, denying the citizens the right to elect their leaders.

“If you look at the data, the challenge with elections in Nigeria, leadership recruitment, is the failure of elections. But the challenge is that so long as the people cannot determine their leadership, then we will have a leadership hijack. So what is happening is hijack, and it is hijacked by people who are clear and present danger to Nigeria,” he said.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chieftain explained that the political class also seceded from Nigeria by caving out a secluded life for themselves and their families. He pointed out that neither the ruling class nor their family members access the same social facilities the citizens access.

“You see, every time we talk in Nigeria, people talk about secession by IPOB or secession by Oduduwa Republic or even the North or anybody. But actually, the real secession that has happened in Nigeria, and a good friend of mine pointed it out to me last two weeks, is that there has been an elite secession in Nigeria. The elites have seceded from Nigeria. And not only have they seceded, their children do not go to public schools. They don’t go to public hospitals. They live in gated communities in Maitama, Asokoro, and Ikoyi, Banana Island. So if you notice, they have no interaction with everyday people. So our leaders cannot think about the everyday people.

“So what you see them think about is road projects, commissioning of bridges, of flyovers. But in reality, the budget does not deal with the basic problems of people. It doesn’t deal with the fundamental restructuring of Nigeria to reflect the changes in our population,” he stated.

The former Minister decried the lack of interest of the ruling class in driving the economy through non-oil sectors.

“For instance, cocoa price is at $12,000 this December. Most of this year is sold at above $9,000. Two years ago, it was $2,700. What is Nigeria doing to benefit from the cocoa boom? Why are we still a primary cocoa exporter instead of exporting butter and cocoa powder, which is semi-processed goods?

“As far back as 1985, President Babangida thought about processing cocoa and provided loans to Nigerian companies. So you have Ile Oluji, you had Cadbury, who were processing cocoa into powder and butter. Today, Nigerians are now exporting raw cocoa, and we don’t have the capacity to meet the lack of capacity that is currently happening in Côte d’Ivoire,” he added.