ABOLITION OF ALL FORMS OF POVERTY IN NIGERIA: WHOSE TASK?

By

Femi Aborisade

Introduction

The topic of discussion has made my task simple because it is, I guess, deliberately, judgmental. It is judgmental because it has concluded, and I absolutely agree, that we live in a world of pervasive and multi-dimensional poverty. We do not therefore have to bother so much explaining the facts of poverty ravaging the lives of ordinary people. We shall refer to the facts of poverty only with a view to putting our discussion within proper context. However, as far as the topic of our discourse is concerned, our task is to have conversation and exchange opinion on the social force(s) that carries/carry the burden to bring about abolition of all forms of poverty and to locate our roles, individually and collectively, within the social class we may identify.

As Frantz Fanon[2], in his “The Wretched of the Earth” (1965: 205) pungently puts it:

“Each generation must out of relative obscurity discover its mission, fulfill it, or betray it”.

I think that by the choice of the topic of today, the organisers seek to re-echo the challenge of Frantz Fanon in order to remind us of our responsibility. 

Outline of Presentation

The remaining parts of my presentation are structured as follows:

1. 1.What do we celebrate in Dr. Osagie Obayuwana and how do we link his celebration with rebuilding the movement for change in Nigeria?
2. 2. What is our understanding of the critical concept in the topic: “Poverty”?
3. 3. What is the critical cause of poverty?  
4. 4. Abolition of poverty: whose task?
5. 5. How do we build forces/movements/parties for change?
6. 6. What should be the manifesto for change?

We begin with why celebrate Dr. Obayuwana.

1. 1. What do we celebrate in Dr. Osagie Obayuwana and how do we link his celebration with rebuilding the movement for change in Nigeria?

Permit me to begin my presentation with paying tributes to the celebrant of today, who I call “our leader”, with pride.

The celebration of Dr. Osagie Obayuwana is a celebration of his consistent commitment to shared ideas, values, principles and struggles of the poor for emancipation. In, or outside the corridors of power, Dr. Obayuwana has demonstrated loyalty to shared cause of social change in the interest of the poor.

I had an opportunity, as President of detainees at Inter-centre detention facility of the State Security Service (SSS) in Ikoyi, Lagos, in 1989, to host him, and to determine the ‘fair’ cell he should be kept. Later on, he was my leader, as Deputy National President of the NCP and the Joint Action Committee of Nigeria (JACON), organizations that actively mobilized Nigerians against military dictatorship. Later, he became the National President of the NCP after the Late Chief Gani Fawehinmi stepped down as National President.  

The history of the struggles for June 12 will be incomplete without reckoning with the courage, guidance, doggedness, fearlessness and irrepressible dispositions of Dr. Obayuwana from his base at 56A, Kano Street, Ebute Mẹta (East), Lagos, which transformed Mainland into the hotbed of militant political actions, as aptly put by Comrade Wale Balogun, one of the central collaborators of the celebrant in Ebute Meta in the course of June 12 struggles.

I asked Comrade Wale Balogun, to send his impression of Dr. Obayuwana to me, in a succinct form, for the purpose of this lecture. He said, and I quote:

“Dr. Obayuwana, a great mobiliser and organiser, coordinated different youth platforms into an organic unit that became the Mainland Progressive Youth Movement (MPYM). MPYM cadres are the members of Campaign for Democracy (CD) and Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR) structures in Lagos Mainland. It was the charisma and extra coordinating ability of Dr Osagie that united notable groups like Wale Balogun-led Dependable Force, Club 20 and militant student leaders, including Ebun Olu Adegboruwa (now a SAN)”

The Unique strength of character of Dr. Obayuwanawas demonstrated on 30th January 2012 when he was committed to prison by Justice Adamu Hobon of the Federal High Court, Benin Judicial Division, for allegedly disobeying an interlocutory court order which was not served on him as Attorney General (AG) of Edo State. Forms 48 and 49 were equally not served on him as the principles of fair hearing require. The Court Order had directed the Edo State Government to hand over Bendel Brewery Ltd to Churchgate Industries Limited. The State Government, underGovernor Lucky Igbinedion’sadministration had challenged the manner of the sale of the company. The court order, directing the hand over of the company to the private company was issued before he became AG of the State. In defence of state ownership of the company, and in opposition to privatisation of Public enterprises, he spent four (4) days in prison before he was granted bail. The Court of Appeal later set aside the order of committal.

Even after his tenure as AG, he has continued to lead popular protests in Edo State, including protests against insecurity and poverty[3].

In my private discussions with him yesterday, 23/4/25, he is not happy about the current state of organization of the Left and the limited impact it has in the larger society. But he is determined to continue to contribute to the collective endeavour of the process of societal transformation.

My goal is to treat the topic of discourse in such a way that it serves the purpose of explaining the unfolding processes and how we may break the stalemate in the nature of the challenges facing the movement for emancipation of the poor.

• 2. What is our understanding of the critical concept in the topic: “Poverty”?

I suggest that poverty may be defined from four main dimensions, namely –

• – Poverty of economic insecurity (survival)
• – Poverty of physical insecurity,
• – Poverty of marginalisation and exclusion from opportunities to participate in political decision-making processes, and
• – Poverty of criminalisation of the right of assembly and peaceful action.  

Poverty of economic insecurity/survival:

This refers to lack of adequate income or financial resources to meet basic existential needs to remain alive physically such as lack of employment to earn income, lack of healthy food, suitable housing, clothing, clean water, access to medical care when ill, education, electricity, etc.

Poverty of physical insecurity:

Physical insecurity has been rising steadily in an unprecedented manner. According to HumAngle Tracker[4], in March 2025 alone, 363 people were killed while 101 others were abducted across Nigeria in violent circumstances. In the first quarter of 2025, no fewer than 1,420 people were killed and 537 others were kidnapped in various tragic incidents across Nigeria.

According to Premium Times Online[5], relying on Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), a global data hub that collects real-time conflict-related data, over 4,500 Nigerians were killed and 7,000 kidnapped in President Tinubu’s first year as President, between 29 May 2023 and 22 May 2024, as against about 2,000 Nigerians that were killed and 3,000 others abducted between 29 May 2022 and 29 May 2023.

The rotten state of insecurity in the country can be represented by the fundraising campaign by retired and serving military officers who raised N400m ransom demanded by bandits as a condition for the release of kidnapped Brigadier General M.I. Tsiga who was abducted from his home in Tsiga Town, Katsina State.

Empirical studies have confirmed that the main driver of banditry is economic. The root cause of insecurity, poverty, is therefore traceable to the character and nature of people holding the reins of power. Currently, society is ruled, predominantly, by people who use public office in conspiracy against the welfare interests of ordinary people. They use state power to benefit themselves, buying jets, yachts and their unelected first ladies donating billions of Naira in vain self-glorification without linking such donations to any productive factories they have, other than looting public treasury. Resources that ought to be used to establish public enterprises, create employment, and meet basic socio-economic needs of the masses are being wasted in corruption. They use state power to impose renewed hardship misnamed “renewed hope”, removing subsidy on fuel, increasing fuel price, devaluing the national currency, and subjecting the survival of ordinary people to great risk. In the past, Fela sang of “suffering and smiling”. Today, it is “suffering and dying” for the masses. The manufacturers and/or sources of the ills, crimes, criminalities and criminals are the anti-people politicians in power.

In his inaugural speech, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu identified insecurity as a top priority of his administration. However, rather than identifying poverty as the root cause, he only promised to invest more in “firepower” solution. According to him, “To effectively tackle this menace, we shall reform both our security doctrine and its architecture. We shall invest more in our security personnel, and this means more than an increase in number. We shall provide better training, equipment, pay, and firepower.[6]”

Part of the solution to insecurity lies in advocating measures for prioritizing basic needs of ordinary people as well as measures against corruption in public office.

Another critical challenge is the phenomena of arbitrary killings of perceived or alleged bandits, terrorists, armed robbers, kidnappers, destruction of farm lands and crops by cattle, etc. Principles and Policies ought to be developed on dealing with these experiences. The Left must take principled positions in order to guide the struggles of ordinary people and be relevant to their pains and agonies.

There is a need for enforcement of recognition of entitlement to rights and obligations to respect the rights of others. Every person is entitled to a fair and equal treatment just as every individual is also obligated to share responsibility for the rights of others. We should insist that cattle rearing is business, which has to be regulated and operated without putting the lives, communal and individually-owned land and businesses of others at risk. Government has a responsibility to bring rights violators to justice, without ethnic profiling. There should be no room for impunity – wherein wrongs are committed and no one is made to be responsible for his or her actions.

Poverty of marginalisation and exclusion from opportunities to participate in political decision-making processes.

This category of “poverty” relates to issues connected with exclusive policies which prevent formation of political parties or trade unions and criminalise freedom of peaceful protests as we witnessed during the 2020 #endsars protests, #endhunger & #endbadgovernance protests on 1^st-10^th August 2023 and the #FearlessinOctober 2024 protests of the youths.

Current Scope of political participation

The current limited scope of political participation – the ritual of voting every four years, without more, is a critical issue that we must campaign against to ensure inclusiveness rather than the current exclusive process.

The polity has been heavily commercialised and only the rich can sponsor parties and candidates. Within the context of extant constitutional provisions, the poor are automatically excluded – national parties must be formed; small parties that are locally based or limited to wards, local governments or states are not allowed.

The constitutional policy of ‘national parties’ is a barrier to popular participation in politics and we should campaign for an amendment. The provisions include:

• S. 222(e) a political party shall not be confined to only one geographical area of Nigeria.
• S. 222(f) the headquarters office of the party must be in Abuja.
• S. 223(1)(b) the national Executive Committee (NEC) of the Party shall reflect Federal Character.

The party structure is thus conceived in the image of a Nigerian institution with nation-wide presence. Only those who have looted public treasury or unduly ‘benefitted’ by the wielders of state power can meet the constitutional requirements and make impact electorally. The poor classes are automatically excluded.

Poverty of criminalisation of the right of assembly and peaceful action

I argue that denial of the Right of Peaceful Protest is a category of Poverty.

Section 14(2)(b) of the Constitution provides that “the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government” while Section 40 of the same Constitution guarantees right of assembly and peaceful action “for the protection of his interest”. These two provisions, read together, mean that any regime that is unable to fulfill the primary purpose of governance has lost the legitimacy to remain in power and to that extent, the people may invoke the right to peaceful revolt to either put pressure on the regime to change its policies that impact on the people negatively or to abdicate power or resign from office.

Repression of peaceful protesters, whenever it occurs, is also a violation of fundamental rights provisions in Sections 39 and 41. Section 39 guarantees the right to freedom of expression and the Press while Section 41 guarantees right to freedom of movement, both of which are exercised during protests.

Pursuant to Constitutional provisions, section 83(1)-(4) of the Police Establishment Act, 2020 gives strength to freedom of movement in section 41 of the Constitution.

Section 83 (1) provides that the Police Force is responsible for maintaining and securing public safety and public order. Section 83 (2) places responsibility on the Police to:

• (a)Uphold the provisions of the Constitution and other laws
• (b)Uphold and protect the fundamental rights of all persons in Nigeria, and
• (c) To be fair to all persons in Nigeria notwithstanding their economic status or religions, ethnic or political beliefs and affiliations

Section 83 (4) gives any protester or organization that seeks to protest the discretion to seek police protection, as follows:

“Where a person or organization notifies the police of his or its intention to hold a public meeting, rally or procession on a public highway or such meetings in a place where the public has access to, the police officer responsible for the area where the meeting rally or procession will take place shall mobilize personnel to provide security cover for the meeting, rally or the procession.”

The provisions of the Police Act in Section 83 are also contained in Section 94 (4) of the Electoral Act, which places the obligation on the Police to provide security for participants in public meetings and rallies, as follows:

“Notwithstanding any provision in the Police Act, the Public Order Act and any regulation made thereunder or any other law to the contrary, the role of the Nigeria Police Force in political rallies, processions and meetings shall be limited to the provision of adequate security as provided in subsection (1) of this section.”

Denial of the right of peaceful protest is therefore not only a form of poverty and enslavement; it is also a coup against the fundamental rights provisions in the Constitution.

Constitutional provisions against poverty of economic insecurity and poverty of physical insecurity

Constitutional provisions exist offering protection against economic insecurity and physical insecurity.

Section 16(2)(d) of the Constitution makes specific provisions to prevent economic insecurity, which could fuel physical insecurity. It places primary responsibility on the government for the satisfaction of Abraham Maslow’s physiological needs, such as “suitable and adequate shelter, suitable and adequate food, reasonable national minimum living wage, old age care and pensions, and unemployment, sick benefits, and welfare of the disabled …for all citizens”.

Section 17 of the Constitution is devoted to fulfilling “social objectives”, which include mandatory provision that “governmental actions shall be humane” [S. 17(2)(c)]; just and humane conditions of work [S. 17(3)(b)] and “adequate medical and health facilities” not just for the Nigerian citizen, but indeed, for “all persons”, in the space called Nigeria. Fulfilling section S. 17(3)(b) of the Constitution would frown and punish medical tourism by the rulers where the masses are sentenced to a collapsed or non-existent medical care system.

Section 18(3)(a)-(d) of the Constitution guarantees free education, from cradle to grave. Where section 18(3) of the Constitution were fulfilled, the phenomenon of criminally neglected poor people fuelling the army of banditry, kidnapping, armed robbery, etc, would have been avoided.

There is thus a linkage between preventing social exclusion or social insecurity and preventing physical insecurity. A society that is incapable of preventing social exclusion cannot prevent physical insecurity.

In the final analysis, income and social inequalities are connected with physical insecurity. Policies which exacerbate inequality, economic insecurity, social inequality, educational inequality, unemployment, social frustration, poverty, etc, would continue to cause a huge physical insecurity and put the future of Nigeria in jeopardy and under grave uncertainties.

However, I am convinced that the constitutionally backed provisions, some of which are herein enumerated would not be implemented willingly by the ruling class. The popular masses, through their organisations, have a role to play. They have to put all levels of government, Federal, State and Local Governments, under the heat of the constitutionally backed right of peaceful mass protests, to compel them to implement the itemized constitutional provisions against poverty of economic insecurity in order to avoid or minimize poverty of physical insecurity.

• 3. What is the critical cause of poverty?

In the literature, there are many factors identified as causes of poverty. However, I wish to restrict myself to what I consider to be the most critical factor. This is Politics being the creator or manufacturer of poverty.

The masses are poor because the rich are rich. The rich are rich because the masses are poor. The simple reason is that the processes for the enrichment of the rich are the processes for immiserisation or impoverishment of the masses.

The resources that ought to be devoted to the wellbeing of the masses are monopolized by the rich in extravagant lifestyles, hordes of overfed aides, donations by the 1st lady who has no known source of livelihood other than the husband being President or Governor; purchase of presidential Jets, Presidential Yachts, cars and buildings, within and outside the country, contractocracy, over-inflated contracts, inexplicable wide income inequality between the rulers/ruiners and ordinary folks earning minimum wage or below minimum wage and those who have no source of income at all.

Immiserisation Policies

Particularly from 1986 till date, the ruling class has devised more or less the same policies under different names, all of which have the aim of deepening poverty under the false claim of fighting poverty. These policies are as follows:

1. 1. 1986: Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) (General IBB)
2. 2. 2003: National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS), as well as its versions at State and Local Government levels, the SEEDS and LEEDS (President Obasanjo)
3. 3. 2007: Yar’Adua’s 7- point Agenda
4. 4. 2009: Vision 20:2020 Agenda (Conceived by President Obasanjo but launched by President Umaru Yar’ Adua in 2009)
5. 5. Jonathan’s ‘Transformation Agenda’ (2011-2015).
6. 6. 2017: APC’s ERGP: Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (President Mohammadu Buhari) and
7. 7. 2023: Renewed Hope (renewed hardship) Agenda of President Tinubu

One thing that is common to all the 7 programs is that they expressly declared/declare commitment to neo-liberal policies of privatisation, liberalization, deregulation and commercialisation of Public Enterprises (PEs), raising prices and tariffs of public goods like fuel, electricity, etc.

According to Swanson and Wolde-Semait,[7] pre-July 1986, about 600 enterprises and 900 smaller ones were operating at the Federal and state/local government levels. Today, almost all of these have been privatised.

The goal of the NEEDS document, to practically hand over the country to the private sector, was unequivocally stated as follows:

“The private sector will be the engine of economic growth under NEEDS. It will be the executor, investor, and manager of businesses…”

(p. xi)

The strategic policy thrust specified in the NEEDS document to attain the above private-sector driven world was for government to first invest in infrastructures with a view to upgrading and developing them before privatisation (p. 59).

The ‘Vision 20:2020’, Yar’Adua’s ‘7- point Agenda and Jonathan’s ‘Transformation Agenda’ (2011-2015) were all built on the same class agenda: promotion of the private Sector, at the expense of public good.

The Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) was nothing but a programme aimed at using public power to dispossess the public of the commonwealth for the interest of a few who have hijacked power, in a conspiracy, against public good.

The ERGP was launched in February 2017 to cover the period 2017-2020. The ERGP (or simply the Plan) declared, unequivocally, that it was an initiative to privatise selected public enterprises (Page 10, last paragraph) and to ‘support the private sector to become the engine of national growth and development”. (Page 11, 3^rd paragraph)

The Plan also contained measures to galvanize the State Governments “towards the same goals”. (Page 11, paragraph 5).

The Plan identified all sectors, including education, healthcare, etc for privatisation. Some specific policy statements in the Plan, included the following:

• In the oil sector: To “reduce the Federal Government’s stake in JV oil ventures” and “significantly reduce Federal

Government stakes in other oil and non-oil assets” (page 47 and 116)

• Electricity subsector: The goal was to “improve the commercial viability of Gencos [i.e. electricity generation companies] and Discos [i.e. electricity distribution companies] and “introduce cost-reflective electricity tariffs” (p. 77, serial No 28).

[A look at the trend of the tabulated tariff between 2002 and 2024 shows steady increase without corresponding service. It took 12 years for electricity tariff to rise from N6 to N12.83, a percentage rise of 113.8. However, in less than two years of the regime of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, electricity tariff rose from N48 to N225, a percentage rise of 368.75]

The renewed hope [hardship] agenda of President Tinubu.

The most vicious and pernicious attacks on living standards have occurred under the current regime.

We can measure the effects of the economy on the living standards of workers and the poor by considering some three factors

• – minimum wage,
• – exchange rate, and
• – electricity tariff.

The Minimum wage in 1981 was N125 per month. The Exchange rate in 1981 was USD$1 to N6 Kobo. In 1981, the Minimum wage of N125 was equivalent to $208. In 1981, fuel was being bought at the rate of 15.3 Kobo per litre. Therefore, the Minimum wage of N125 could purchase 817 litres of fuel. In May 2023, the Minimum wage of N30,000 (Thirty Thousand Naira) could buy 154 litres. As at 22nd April 2025, when a litre of fuel was sold for N890/litre, the Minimum Wage of N70, 000 (Seventy thousand Naira), where and if paid, could buy only 78.7 litres compared to 154 litres in May 2023 and 817 litres in 1981.

As against the Exchange rate of USD$1 to 6 Kobo in 1981, as at 23/4/25, according to Providence Television (PTV) News on-the-hour, US$1 exchanged for one thousand, six hundred and two Naira, (i.e. N 1,602).

The realities also show that in the entire history of devaluation of the national currency or devaluation of living standards or destruction of living standards, the regime of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has surpassed all others.

For the masses of our people, life appears to have been turned upside down from 29th of May 2023. Exchange Rate as at May 2023 shortly before President Tinubu took over was USD$1 to N461. As at today, the Exchange Rate is USD$1 to N1,602, as stated above. Under two years, May 2023-April 2025, there has been a percentage change (or devaluation) in the value of the national currency, the Naira, by 247.5%.

Below is the tabulated electricity tariff terror, from 2002-2024

ELECTRICITY TARIFF TERROR: 2002-2024

Source: adapted from tabulation by COALITION FOR AFFORDABLE AND REGULAR ELECTRICITY (CARE) & WHERE IS THE LIGHT

A look at the tabulated tariff above shows that it took 12 years for electricity tariff to rise from N6 (in 2002) to N12.83 (in 2014), a percentage rise of 113.8. However, in less than two years of the regime of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, electricity tariff rose from N48 to N225, a percentage rise of 368.75%.

UNDERSTANDING PRESIDENT BOLA AHMED TINUBU (PBAT)

It is critically important to understand President Bola Ahmed Tinubu from the point of view of the difficulties being faced by ordinary people.

Two important position papers authored by PBAT may be used to know who the President is, from the standpoint of the masses.

The first is the statement dated 8th January 2012 but published on 11th January 2012 entitled “Removal of oil subsidy: President Jonathan Breaks Social Contract with the People”. It is still available online.

In that paper, President Tinubu opposed the fuel price increase under Jonathan. He called it “the Jonathan Tax”, meant to “make the New Year a bitter one” for the masses.

I think the most important part of the paper of the then Asiwaju Tinubu (now PBAT) lies in the understanding, as he expressly put it in the paper, that:

“…As there is progressive politics, there is progressive economics. As there is elitist politics, there is elitist economics. It all depends on what and who in society government would rather favor. ..

The second paper is the Presidential Speech entitled “Nigeria’s economic challenges” delivered on the 31st day of July 2023 in his bid to explain the hardship following removal of fuel subsidy, by his regime. 

The 12th paragraph of the Presidential Speech sums up the essence of the 44-Paragraph speech and perhaps the essence of his government. The summary of the Presidential Speech is that for the masses, there is no alternative to suffering, hardship, uncertainty, and hurting tough life.

The 12th paragraph goes as follows:

“Our economy is going through a tough patch and you are being hurt by it. The cost of fuel has gone up. Food and other prices have followed it. Households and businesses struggle. Things seem anxious and uncertain. I understand the hardship you face. I wish there were other ways. But there is not. If there were, I would have taken that route as I came here to help not hurt the people and nation that I love.”

The essence of the Presidential Speech therefore is that the reign of PBAT promises hell on Earth, pains and pangs for the masses.

We need to appreciate that the capitalist ruling class does not rule in the common or mutual interest of all classes. The ruling class rules, not in the interest of the “nation” but in the interest of the capitalist class.

PBAT is the best representative of this class who does not pretend that he is in power to rule in the interest of the bourgeoisie. He makes it clear that, for the masses, there is no alternative to his pervasive poverty-perpetrating policies.

If we apply the principle he espoused in his January 2012 paper to his 2023 fuel subsidy removal, it is that PBAT consciously uses State Power to benefit the capitalist class and punish the masses. It is a choice, a political choice.

• 4. Abolition of poverty: whose task?

We have seen above that the various dimensions and/or manifestation of poverty affects the poor strata, with the exception of those in the corridors of power. The question which this subsection seeks to answer is of all those social groups disadvantaged under the present system, which of them is in a position to consistently lead the struggles against poverty and re-organize society.

In answering this question, I take recourse to the thoughts of Marx and Engels, in the Communist Manifesto (1948).

Marx and Engels contend that:

“Of all the classes that stand face to face with the bourgeoisie today, the proletariat alone is a really revolutionary class. The other classes decay and finally disappear in the face of Modern Industry; the proletariat is its special and essential product.

The lower middle class, the small manufacturer, the shopkeeper, the artisan, the peasant, all these fight against the bourgeoisie, to save from extinction their existence as fractions of the middle class. They are therefore not revolutionary, but conservative. Nay more, they are reactionary, for they try to roll back the wheel of history. If by chance, they are revolutionary, they are only so in view of their impending transfer into the proletariat; they thus defend not their present, but their future interests, they desert their own standpoint to place themselves at that of the proletariat.

The “dangerous class”, [lumpenproletariat] the social scum, that passively rotting mass thrown off by the lowest layers of the old society, may, here and there, be swept into the movement by a proletarian revolution; its conditions of life, however, prepare it far more for the part of a bribed tool of reactionary intrigue”.[8]

The foregoing tells us that while different layers of the middle class (and these include peasants, students, petty traders, professionals, the unemployed, lumpen proletariat) also suffer from the effects of capitalism, they cannot consistently participate or lead the struggle for change, even though they often look up to organized labour and have to be mobilized in an alliance with organized labour.

The recognition of the working class as the social class to lead the struggle for change means that middle-class change seekers have to undertake serious attention to developments within organized labour.

• 5. How do we build forces/movements/parties for change?

The declaration that the proletariat is the class that can lead the struggle for sustained change does not necessarily mean that organized labour, as presently constituted can automatically assume that role.

The top leadership of many of the unions is perceived to be compromised, acting more or less as representatives of the ruling class who have resolved to apply the brakes at every critical point requiring decisive class action.

The concern then is how do socialists and radical unionists organise to win political power?

Three main tendencies have emerged. The first tendency appears to advocate only pressure group type of activism. This tendency is interested in trade unions actively fighting for the rights of workers but it appears disinterested in unions having political objectives/agenda.

The second tendency is the trend represented by the Campaign for Socialist Transformation of Nigeria (CAST). It argues that Socialists should build political forces independent of the Labour Party (LP), on a clear socialist Manifesto.

The third tendency argues that given the organisational weakness of socialist revolutionaries, joining or developing an orientation towards the LP, which has a larger base of support, is advisable, regardless of the weakness of the LP in ideological terms, provided the LP expresses commitment to basic welfare issues touching on the day-to-day lives of the masses.

There appears to be a stalemate:

1. 1. There is unprecedented deepening of poverty on a daily basis. This, in other words, refers to the ripeness of the objective factors.
3. 2.The bourgeois ruling class cannot take society forward. It appears totally incapable of solving any of the dimensions of poverty (poverty as economic insecurity, poverty as physical insecurity, poverty as political exclusion, and poverty as criminalization of freedom of peaceful action).  
5. 3. The masses are yearning for action and looking up to organised labour. Pressure is continually on the leadership of organised labour to fight. But a certain pattern appears to have emerged that notices of threat of action would be called off just when action ought to commence. On the industrial front, labour leadership appears to have fallen below the expectation of the masses.
7. 4. On the political front, Marxist revolutionaries have also failed to politically organise the masses, including workers. This, in other words, refers to the weakness or near absence of the subjective factor. 

To Lenin, the task of overthrowing capitalism and engendering a socialist transformation of society requires the critical leadership of the most advanced communists, intellectuals and workers, constituting the revolutionary vanguard party of the working class. From the Leninist perspective, the Vanguard Party is the main vehicle for effecting social change, that is, the vehicle to move from the undesirable to the desirable state of life.

In the concept of the Vanguard Party, Lenin recognises the limitation of pure economism that characterises trade unionism. Without necessarily discounting the possibility of workers gaining socialist consciousness based on their experiences in the workplace, Lenin contends that workers can arrive at class political consciousness only from outside the sphere of worker-employer economic relationship. In other words, workers can gain class political consciousness only from the context of wider issues, within, as well as outside employer-worker relationship or interrelationships between all classes, including  experiences of employer-worker relationship. Restricted to only the employer-worker relationship, the worker is likely to gain only economist or trade unionist consciousness, at best.

Implicit in Lenin’s Vanguard Party concept is an understanding that trade unions are primarily institutions set up for negotiations and bargaining with the employer class, which may, more often than not, involve concessions, principled and unprincipled. There is therefore much scepticism about any idea that suggests reliance only on the trade union structure as a means to challenge State power. However, historically, the only impactful challenge to capitalist state power has come through the unions, weak as they are. Without the unions, the Left, in Nigeria, is totally marginalised, organisationally.

At the same time, the Vanguard Party concept should not be mistaken for sectarianism in which a few socialists, without roots in the working class, proclaim themselves as the Vanguard Party, which workers must join, as some organisations on the Nigerian Left have historically done. Rather, the idea of the Vanguard Party should today be understood as the leadership of socialist revolutionaries, that actively supports the practical, day-to-day struggles of all segments of the downtrodden, including the unions; that acts as the tribune of the oppressed, struggling against tyrannical policies of the State; that analyses and locates working-class struggles within a wider societal context; that provides the working class and the poor with socialist ideas that aid successful mass action from below, etc. In other words, an organisation is neither socialist nor vanguard just because it names itself as such. It must, by its statements, analyses and activities, demonstrate that it is pro-active, advocating policies and measures that will put the working class and its allies in an improved economic and political situation.

The Left in Nigeria should take interest in building the political organisations of the working people and participating in elections. From the Leninist perspective, workers and the poor should participate in elections. The argument of some Left organizations in Nigeria today, suggesting that socialists should not participate in bourgeois elections, is, in my opinion, misconceived.

The caution which the Leninist perspective offers is against what Marx and Engels originally called the “incurable disease of Parliamentary cretinism” (a misconception that a socialist society can be achieved solely by peaceful, parliamentary means as opposed to class struggle). What is important is that independent political action of the working class should not be constrained on account of participation in parliamentary elections or on account of electoral victories. In other words, participation in electoral politics should be subordinated to independent working class industrial and/or political actions led or supported by socialists or organizations of socialists and/or workers.

The crisis in society will compel the masses to walk the road of revolution. Until then, socialists should find the way to the masses, and particularly, the working class, in their daily struggles, during or outside the period of parliamentary elections. The misconception that a self-proclaimed ‘socialist vanguard’ party alone will carry out the revolution should never be nurtured. History is made by the masses, not by a few. However, as Trotsky once put it, “a revolution takes place only when there is no other way out.” Until that glorious moment, socialists should patiently build and work among workers and the poor, organised or unorganised. Building political leadership among the rank and file of workers and the poor, on employment and non-employment issues affecting the daily lives of the masses, with or without the top leadership of the unions, is the way forward in building the ‘vanguard’ party in the current phase of history.

There is a relationship between the capacity to fight for improvement in daily living conditions and capacity to fight for political power.

Pro-Labour/masses organizations should strive to build platforms to support the struggles of the different strata of the masses, including workers, for improvement in their daily living conditions. A movement that is incapable of fighting successfully for improvement in daily living conditions cannot fight for political power.

Use the influence gained in the struggles for improvement in daily living conditions to build political influence. The struggles of the masses for improvement in daily living conditions should be linked with the struggle for political power. The masses can develop confidence to struggle for political power only if they are able to fight confidently to improve their daily living conditions.

Towards this end, pro-masses organizations should resolve to:

1. 1. pool resources together;
2. 2. Engage young people on full time basis whose dreams and life are totally devoted to supporting any strata of the masses in struggle.
3. 3. Engage young people on full time basis to work among students, particularly at tertiary education levels. He who has the youth, has the future. This is the approach of the religious bodies in establishing Seminaries where they train young people to run their Missions in the future.
4. 4. Without full time workers, any talk about building alternative political platforms of the Left is a huge joke.
5. 5. Establish media outfits, particularly, online media networks;
6. 6. Form or join political parties or support particular candidates or sponsor candidates for election.
7. 7. Pay attention to developments in trade union leadership (elective or appointive positions) at all levels. Politicians pay attention to appointments at all levels, including magistrates and judges in courts of record. The least we can do is pay attention to leadership in trade unions. Have a Working Committee on trade union leadership.
8. 8. Establish Working Committee on rendering services, including legal services to workers’ challenges, particularly for the ununionized, on a paid and pro-bono arrangements, depending on merit.
9. 9. Establish Working Committee for community support.
10. 10. LP, NCP and other Left Parties: Establish Working Committee to follow development in the LP and assist in reclaiming LP, and/or strengthening or collaborating with or arranging synergy within Left political formations.

• 6. What should be the manifesto for change?

I advocate the following as a tentative framework for the manifesto for change.

CHAPTER 2 OF THE CONSTITUTION

• – Implement Chapter 2 of the Constitution or transfer chapter 2 provisions to chapter 4 of the Constitution such that socioeconomic rights are constitutionally backed as fundamental rights.
• – a community reading of all relevant sections of the Constitution make chapter 2 justiciable. These sections are:
• – S. 6(6)(c), CFRN, 1999
• – S. 1(1), CFRN, 1999.
• – Section 13, CFRN, 1999.
• – section 224, CFRN, 1999, and
• – Item 60(a) of the Exclusive Legislative List.
• – The Oaths sworn to by the President, Vice President, Governor, Deputy Governor, Minister, Commissioner, Special Adviser and members of the National Assembly and House of Assembly of the State includes “striv[ing] to preserve” Chapter 2 of the Constitution.
• – S.6(6)(C) Does Not Completely Foreclose Justiciability of Chapter II It allows justiciability or enforcement of Chapter 2 if there is provision for enforcement in any other section of the Constitution.
• – S. 1(1), CFRN, 1999, as amended, proclaims the supremacy and bindingness of the Constitution and Chapter 2 being part of the Constitution, is therefore binding.
• – Section 13 provides that all authorities and persons exercising legislative, executive or judicial powers ‘shall’ observe and apply Chapter II.
• – Section 224 provides that:

‘The programme as well as the aims and objects of a political party shall conform with the provisions of Chapter II of this Constitution’ (S. 224, CFRN, 1999).

• – Item 60(a) of the Exclusive Legislative List places responsibility on the Federal Government to establish and regulate ‘authorities for the Federation or any part thereof – to promote and enforce the observance of the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles contained in this Constitution’

ANTI-PRIVATISATION POLICIES

• – Reverse privatization of PEs as recommended by the Senator Ahmad Lawan-led Senate Committee “REPORT OF THE AD-HOC COMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATION OF THE PRIVATIZATION AND COMMERCIALIZATION ACTIVITIES OF THE BUREAU OF PUBLIC ENTERPRISES (BPE) FROM 1999 TO 2011”
• – Pursuant to Section 16(3) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, as amended, the National Assembly should enact an Act for the establishment of a body that would review ownership and control of businesses operating in Nigeria and to actualize reversal of all past privatizations which were factually found to have been characterized by abuses, illegality and fraud;
• – Prosecute identified individuals who compromised processes and facilitated looting of public wealth through privatization.
• – Recover looted wealth in whatever forms, cash, assets, shares, and any other forms the illicit funds have been invested.
• – The National Assembly should enact an Act to set up a Trust Fund into which shall be lodged recovered loot and assets, which shall be committed to implementing specific public programs/projects.
• – Stoppage of contractocracy in the execution of public projects in preference for direct labour and empowerment of public agencies, ministries and Departments in the execution of public projects.
• – Salaries of elected and/or appointed public officers to be within the salary structure in the public service, subject only to payment of incidental expenses as they arise

Policies to facilitate social and political organization of workers and the poor

• – Effect labour law reform and delete S. 15 of the Trade Unions Act, which prohibits trade unions from applying union funds, directly or indirectly, for political objectives.
• – Right to collective bargaining and unionisation as fundamental rights; oppose resistance to unionisation.
• – repeal of obnoxious and draconian laws, including the Petroleum Production and Distribution (Anti-Sabotage) Act, CAP P.12, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004, which provides for death penalty or imprisonment for a term not exceeding 21 years.
• – a decent work agenda that make all employers, private employment agencies, and all other operators & contractors to be bound by the ILO’s fundamental rights at work, including right to freedom of association, expression, right of peaceful protest and strike.
• – right of independent candidacy in national political elections.
• – The constitutional right of political parties to exist and campaign for elective offices regardless of scope of influence, even if locally based or limited to wards, local governments or states.
• – the right to strike and opposition to “no work no pay”, particularly in the context of Section 30(6)(b) &(c) of the Trade Unions Act.
• – Right to strike[9] particularly in cases involving disputes of right and where the employer breaches contracts of employment or Collective Agreements.

Policies against economic insecurity

• – National Minimum Wage (NMW): support for strike and litigation in the event of non-payment of NMW. (NMWA, in S. 13 provides for enforcement of the provisions of the Act by the worker concerned, directly; TUs and the Minister of Labour and Productivity/authorized officer). The NMWA provides for penalties for breach, which include a fine not exceeding 5% of the offender’s wage bill (S. 9(2)(a) and additional penalty of not less than the prevailing CBN lending rate, payable to the worker [S. 9(2)(c)].
• – Payment of compensation or interest in the event of non-payment of wages/salaries as and when due[10].
• – Universal Social Protection Floor: to prevent extreme poverty, establish ILO’s Universal Social Protection Floor involving guaranteed income security for individuals and families exposed to life cycle risks. That low- and middle-income countries should set aside an additional investment of US$ 1.4 trillion or 3.3 per cent of the aggregate GDP[11] (2024) of these countries, including 2 per cent of GDP or US$833 billion for essential health care and 1.3 per cent of GDP or US$552 billion for five social protection cash benefits – child, disability, old-age, maternity, and unemployment benefits.
• – Guaranteed income for the vulnerable segments of the society, the unemployed, children, sick and the elderly, regardless of whether or not they worked in the public sector in their old age.
• – Opposition to medical tourism by the rulers while the masses are condemned to collapsed medical system.

Conclusion

“The Philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The Point, however, is to change it[12].”

In order to change our world, we need to:

• – understand the unfolding processes, the way society is organized such that it only sinks the masses into deeper levels of poverty;
• – undergo a process of reflection and working out manifestos which are subject to review from time to time, and
• – Pose the question why radical forces have limited political impact in spite of lives of absolute dedication to the cause of the masses by the Obayuwanas.

This paper has identified and paid tributes to the consistency of the celebrant, Dr. Osagie Obayuwana, who though has devoted his entire life advocating and fighting for the cause of the downtrodden, he remains unhappy with limited influence of radical forces for change.

The paper has offered a definition of poverty from four points of view, arguing that poverty does not only mean lack of financial resources; it includes political exclusion. The paper argues that poverty is created, mainly, by politics. The seven main programmes through which the masses have continued to be plunged into extreme poverty, particularly since 1986 are identified. The paper argues that though all the disadvantaged segments of the society are negatively affected by the policies that have perpetrated immiserisation, only the working class is the revolutionary social class that can lead the struggle for abolition of poverty. The middle class cannot consistently play the role. The paper identifies a minimum manifesto for abolition of all forms of poverty. This includes tasks for transforming the trade union movement from the public perception of its being the political police of the state to being organs of class struggle. Suggestions have been made for rebuilding the movement for  emancipatory struggles for power, rather than a continuation of pressure group and/or sectarian politics.     

I hope this presentation will provoke discussions and some action towards strengthening the re-organization of the broad movement for change.

I thank you all for your attention.

Femi Aborisade

24^th April 2025.

[1] Text of Lecture delivered at the 70^th birthday of Dr. Osagie Obayuwana on 24/4/25 at NBA Benin Branch Secretariat, Bar House, Behind High Court of Justice, Sapele Road, Benin City, Edo State.

[2] https://abahlali.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Frantz-Fanon-The-Wretched-of-the-Earth-1965.pdf

[3] https://tell.ng/insecurity-obayuwana-ex-edo-attorney-general-agents-of-government-bicker-over-disruption-of-protest/ as at 18/4/2025

[4] Source: https://humanglemedia.com/timeline-363-people-killed-101-others-abducted-across-nigeria-in-march/ as at 23/4/25

[5] Source: https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/698217-updated-4500-nigerians-killed-7000-kidnapped-in-tinubus-first-year-as-president.html?tztc=1 as at 23/4/25

[6] Source: https://www.premiumtimesng.com/news/698217-updated-4500-nigerians-killed-7000-kidnapped-in-tinubus-first-year-as-president.html?tztc=1 accessed online on 23/4/25.

[7] Swanson, D. & Wolde-Semait, T. (1989) Africa’s Public Enterprise Sector and Evidence of Reforms, World Bank

[8] Source: Available online at https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch01.htm as at 23/4/25

[9] Right to strike as allowed under Sections 30(6)(b) & (c) of the Trade Unions Act.

[10] By Underwater Eng. Co. Ltd v. Dubefon [1995] 6 NWLR (Pt. 400) 156 SC, an employee’s salary becomes due and his right to it is vested at the end of each month.

[11] Available at https://www.ilo.org/sites/default/files/2024-12/ILO_financing%20brief_web_version_finale.pdf as at 21/4/25

[12] Karl Marx, Eleven Theses on Feuerbach (accessed online at https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/17310-the-philosophers-have-only-interpreted-the-world-in-various-ways as at 24/4/25.