Peter Obi, who ran for president in the past, has said that President Bola Tinubu has lied to Nigerians.
He said this in response to President Bola Tinubu’s claim that Nigeria is better than some African countries, like Kenya.
He wrote on his 𝕏 account on Monday that Tinubu should stop lying to Nigerians with propaganda and downplaying the country’s security and economic problems.
Obi said, “In a recent comment in Yenagoa, Bola Ahmed Tinubu said that Nigerians should find comfort in being ‘better off than Kenya and other African countries.'”
The former Labour Party (LP) candidate said that Tinubu’s comments may have been meant to make the situation in Nigeria less bad because of rising fuel prices and economic problems, but they “risk downplaying the severity of the current crisis.”
“It reminds me of the story in the Gospel of Luke (18:9–14) about the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. He said, “The Qur’an (53:32) gives a similar warning against being self-righteous.”
Obi said that these kinds of comparisons, like the Pharisee who bragged about how much better he was than others to hide his own spiritual emptiness, are more of a refuge than a solution.
“This backed up something President Ahmed Bola Tinubu said before the election: ‘Na statistics we go shop?'”Obi said, “But statistics are still necessary; they are the language through which countries understand their situation and plan their progress.”
“No nation can progress in isolation from quantifiable realities or without benchmarking against contemporaries.
When done right, comparisons aren’t ways to escape reality; they’re ways to hold people accountable. He said, “What is objectionable is not comparison itself, but comparison stripped of credible, verifiable data, mere tax collector comparisons that soothe rather than solve.”
Obi also gives more data to back up his claim that Nigeria is behind Kenya in a number of important development areas.
He said, “Kenya consistently outperforms Nigeria on important development indicators like security, the Human Development Index, life expectancy, GDP per capita, literacy levels, and access to electricity.”
He went on to say, “Nigeria is the fourth most terrorized country in the world, but Kenya is not one of the ten worst.
Kenya’s HDI score is about 0.630, which puts it 143rd out of 180 countries. Nigeria’s score is about 0.530, which puts it 164th out of 180 countries.
Its GDP per person is about $2,200–$2,300, which is a lot more than Nigeria’s $807–$835.
Kenya has a poverty rate of about 43% of its population (about 23 million people), while Nigeria has a rate of about 63% (about 150 million people), which is more than six times that of Kenya.
“Kenya’s life expectancy is about 67 years, but Nigeria’s is only about 54 years. About 81–85% of people in Kenya can read and write, while only 62–65% of people in Nigeria can.
Obi also talked about differences in infrastructure, education, and the overall stability of the economy.
He said, “Kenya has more access to electricity than Nigeria, which has one of the lowest levels of access to electricity in the world.” There are about 3.5 million children in Kenya who are not in school, and about 20 million in Nigeria.
“Kenya’s inflation rate has been 4.5% or lower for the past three years, but Nigeria’s has stayed above 15% during that time.”
Obi also said that Kenya’s exchange rate has stayed around USD 1 to KES 130 for the past three years. In the same time period, Nigeria’s exchange rate has gone from less than ₦500/$1 to more than ₦1,250/$1.
He stressed that “Kenyans have not seen the sharp rises in petroleum product prices that Nigerians have seen, even with events in the Middle East and rising oil prices.”
Obi told President Tinubu to stop using what he called “self-consolatory rhetoric” and instead face the facts about the country with honesty and responsibility.
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