The former Communication Minister Adebayo Shittu, has narrated how many Nigerians have turned into beggars as a result of the nation’s high poverty rate.
In an appearance on Focus Nigeria, an AIT program, Shittu gave examples of how Nigeria’s economic situation has made its people destitute.
The former minister, who resides in Ibadan, claimed that a Nigerian from Bauchi contacted him pleading for N1,000 so that he could buy food, and that another woman called him thirty times pleading for N3,000. “Someone called me from Bauchi yesterday before I left Ibadan and pleaded with me for N1,000,” he stated.
He claimed to have gone two days without eating. Once more, almost a week ago, I received a call from a woman requesting N3,000. Unbelievably, I didn’t have that much money at the time she requested that morning, and the woman contacted me thirty times in a single day.
He insisted that the nation has made poverty a weapon to the point that, when seeking votes, politicians are more interested in what the politicians can give them rather than what they are capable of doing.
“It’s not my business to alleviate the poverty of such people calling,” Shittu declared. They therefore don’t care what you are capable of doing when you approach them to solicit their support or votes. What they can obtain from you now is what interests them.
The former minister, who was in the Muhammadu Buhari administration from 2015 to 2019, stated that he does not currently have any money because he did not steal while in service, which goes against Nigerians’ perceptions about political appointees.
He claimed that for politicians who did not steal while in office, life after their appointment can be difficult.
Shittu claimed he relies on the monthly resources his 10 graduating children give him for upkeep.