DespanKwardem

Author, Editor, Content Creator, Youth Development Practitioner

[Federal Ministry of Youth Development, Nigeria @fmydNG]

PRESS RELEASE

18 January 2025

FG Launches Youth Farmers Enrollment Portal to Address Unemployment, Food Insecurity

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

Exploring youth and multilateral solutions for present and future generations #SOTFNG
#SummitOfTheFutureNigeria
#SummitOfTheFuture
#SummitOfTheFutureNigeria24

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

We haven't touched on the House of Reps, or State Houses of Assembly or Federal Ministers or State Commissioners in the equation yet.

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

Governors say 60k minimum wage is not sustainable. I guess we need to have a maximum wage of not more than 10m for public officials (elected and/or appointed). Their wage bill is also not sustainable...

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

Can u imagine that a senator receiving 29.45m can pay 295 people at 100k each month?

So the entire 109 senators can pay 32,108 persons.

How many state governments have 32k workers on their payroll that governors will claim they cannot pay 60k?

[oseni rufai @ruffydfire]

Salaries for govt officials in 1979

[Naija Activist @Naija_Activist]

He built Lagos.

He built Lagos.

When it reach to build Nigeria cement finish.

Hardship knows no tribe, when it hits, it hits everyone.

[Solomon Dalung @SolomonDalung]

NIGERIA WE HAIL THEE:

When patriots interrogate credibility of governance, the natural reactions of attack dogs will be to demean the personality of those concerned by distracting attention from the issues at stake.

The nation’s statecraft has been navigating great storm instigated by reckless economic policies that defies common logic but yet celebrated in moron traditions as act of courage. There was red flag of impending catastrophe when @officialABAT said during electioneering campaign that “power is not given, you have to grabbed it and run away with it”. This was underestimated by the opposition as huge joke, hence vigilance was abandoned and the electorate calamity was successfully imposed courtesy of “technical glitch”.

Instead of arresting the contagious electoral process, opposition elements naively conformed to the riot act of the ignoble electoral umpire, “if you are dissatisfied with the results go to court”. Was this not a sufficient signal to be guided by the Eastern African proverb which says “if a thief asked you to go to court it is because his brother is the judge”. The opposition elements instead fell prey to @inecnigeria chairman’s trap by embarking on a futile judicial voyage whose conclusion was fait accompli.

The @NLCHeadquarters sponsored a candidate in the election which was internationally accepted as flawed, yet they failed to deploy Odinga’s vaccine to inoculate the electoral malady, therefore, power marauders appropriated the people’s victory. Political bandits were emboldened by the lukewarm attitude of the opposition which became more catholic than the pope. If @NLCHeadquarters had taken the revolutionary gauntlet, the power of the streets would have redefined our destiny.

Now that mercenary politicians had captured the state we are all casualties of complacency of a docile political community. The current industrial action by @NLCHeadquarters is self serving which isolate the people from a jaundiced regime which callously inflicted monumental trauma on Nigerians. The current approach will only endanger the wellbeing of already impoverished poor masses by escalating inflation and cost of living. All that is required is an all inclusive and robust strategy to hold the government accountable.

Even though the industrial action is inevitable, the proper prescription for the current leadership epidemic is another “SAVE NIGERIA” or Raila Odinga’s vaccine. The living wage demands of @NLCHeadquarters is necessary but Nigerians also deserve a survival wage. The remuneration of the @NationalAssemb1 is provocative and callous.
God save Nigeria.

[Dr Joe Abah, OON @DrJoeAbah]

This is wrong on many counts @DrCOmole. It’s just that I don’t currently have the time to address it in depth. Suffice it to say that a minimum wage of N60,000 per month is just N2,700 per day, using a 22-day work month.

You cannot say that people should not factor in cost of transportation, food, electricity and petrol in calculating minimum wage. That’s bizarre.

It is also NOT true that most public servants have all manners of allowances. Maybe you mean NASS members. Please look up the Monetisation Policy of 2003.

Finally, anyone trained in negotiation skills knows that you don’t give your best offer first. That is why if something sells for an average of N100 and you tell me it’s N500, I will price you N10. When you reduce to N400, I will increase to N20…until we both decide to stop wasting each other’s time.

I am ideologically opposed to strikes as a means of resolving labour disputes but we have ALWAYS had people negotiating for government on the basis of the offices they hold not because they have had any training in negotiation.

Let me leave it here for now.

[Dr Joe Abah, OON @DrJoeAbah]

Thanks, Doc. Until there was a tiny increase a few months ago, a fresh graduate in the civil service took home about N48k (all in, including allowances). A Director that has put in 27 years of meritorious service, with a PhD on top, took home less than N300k (all in, including allowances).

The pay and allowances of a few agencies like CBN, NIMASA, NCC and others can give the impression that people are reasonably compensated in the rest of the public service. That is not the case at all.

Majority are performing miracles just to get to work everyday. Any economic shock like sickness or a Caesarean delivery immediately plunges them into abject poverty. That is the context.

As a private citizen, I pay my domestic staff more than the government pays many of its staff. E get as e be na, Doc.

[Sahara Reporters @SaharaReporters]

Falana Urges National Assembly Members To Pass New Minimum Wage Act In 48 Hours As They Did For National Anthem | Sahara Reporters https://t.co/gy8aOB2lcs

[Abdul-Aziz Na'ibi Abubakar @jrnaib2]

Those who protested against:
- Fuel at N87 per litre
- Inflation rate at 9%
- $1 at N200
- Bag of rice
- Unemployment at 8.2%

Are now defending:
- Fuel at N700 per litre
- Inflation rate at 30%
- 1$ at N1,400
- Bag of rice at N65,000
- Unemployment rate 33%
HYPOCRITES!

[Nigeria Labour Congress HQ @NLCHeadquarters]

What a Nation! Aluta Continua!

[Nigeria Labour Congress HQ @NLCHeadquarters]

Can They deny this???? Nigeria Workers deserve Better, A living Wage is Possible

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

@aedcelectricity It's not true. We've been without light since yesterday morning (Asokoro by AA Rano). No one has responded to our complaints

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

@aedcelectricity we haven't had light for 2 days now( Asokoro by AA Rano). No response to our complaints other than we are on it... Haba!!!

[NEFERTITI @firstladyship]

Peter Obi will remain my President. The Judiciary in Nigeria are a bunch of Rogues, & Mary Odili is their Queen B. Tinubu will waste another precious years of yours lives, just like Buhari. The circle will continue, until Nigerians decide to break the jinx.

UNTIL YOU SAY - ENOUGH!!

Nigeria is not a good place to raise children. Buhari wasted eight precious years of the Gen Zs. Tinubu is about to waste the formative years of the Generation Alphas as well. Nigeria has ruined so many lives in its wake, & ‘he’ makes no apologies for that!

People just want to grab power, what they do with it, is not your business! In Nigeria, the least qualified ‘rule’ the most qualified. Politics is big business; people keep on voting, the legislature & the courts continue to sit. And that is how the Democracy in Nigeria died out, without any official proclamation. A Sad Story by many stretch.

Again, Nigerians are thrown into mourning. Nigeria is thrown into an uncertain future. IT’S BLACK WEDNESDAY; there is “Silence of the Graveyard” everywhere! We are reliving the dreadful February 26-27 “Silence of the Lamb” yet again!! 💔

The Establishment has done Nigerians one better. Like conquering Caesar, they have crossed the Rubicon & marched on Nigeria. There will be no jubilation, no bonfires, Nigerians will continue to live in peace under great fear, in what is best described as the “Pax Nigeriana or Nigerian Peace.”

What was once possible is almost impossible. A dream written in Gold & said to posses an almost magical powers that will change Nigeria for good. A man, not a Saint, inspired our long-lost voices. But there is yet HOPE! The journey to recovering & restoring Nigeria has just began.

The Establishment has played all their cards, they have no more surprises. We must now go back to the drawing board & restrategize. We must rethink this Opposition, we must change our style. I will await for Peter Obi to lead the way, I will wait for his guidance, then I’ll say more. Hang in there my darlings.

State Capture is real, & it’s everywhere! We’ve just been dealt a huge blow by the compromised judiciary. But 2023 was never a sprint, it’s a marathon. I must urge you to remain strong, because this race is not for the weak. Nigeria must hit bottom-below-under before he’ll rise. We are divers, the wreckage underwater must give up its secrets.

I urge you Nigerians, don’t give up the fight! Posterity is still with you. The world is with you. All the Heavens hear you. And when the righteous are finally on the throne, your pent-up euphoria will erupt like a volcano. From that moment on, patriotism will be your anthem, the mood of all Nigeria.

[Manasseh Allen @salakwa1]

2019 they employed card readers, but later said results of card readers should not be admissible in court.

2023 they deployed the use of BVAS machine and insisted on its use to transmit results. With repeated appearance to convince Nigerians on the credibility of the process.

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

And talk not about the pains that
birth the winds.

Well

Those who claim to be democrats must talk to themselves to realign their governance to be citizen-centred, otherwise they too, will be swept off by the tsunami.

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

Hypocrisy of the Democrats

I'm thrilled by the wind blowing across Africa.
Mali, Burkina Faso, Chad, Niger, Gabon...

Where's next?

Not a single place witnessed citizens resistance or displeasure after the wind blew. For those citizens it was welcome relief.

[DespanKwardem @DespanKwardem]

They host conferences and talk about the people's problems over tea and coffee and haughty banters

Hypocrites

They send gifts to themselves
Fattening the accounts with
the people's sweat and tears

Now caught in the wind
Suddenly they remember constitutional order...