Human rights lawyer Femi Falana has called on President Bola Tinubu’s administration to allocate at least five trillion naira this year to social investment programmes, warning that poverty levels in Nigeria have reached an “unacceptable” scale.
Speaking on Channels Television on Monday, Falana said the Federal Government has a legal duty under the National Social Investment Programmes Agency Act 2023 to adequately fund welfare schemes such as the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme, the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme and the Conditional Cash Transfer scheme.
“With over 133 million multidimensionally poor Nigerians, the matter has gone beyond appealing to governors,” he said. “The law imposes a duty on the federal government to fund these programmes. There can be no basis not to allocate at least five trillion naira this year to address increasing poverty in the land.”
Falana accused members of the National Assembly of inserting 11,000 budget items worth 6.9 trillion naira into the 2025 budget while poverty alleviation schemes remain underfunded.
The senior lawyer also urged the President, as leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), to persuade state governors to domesticate and enforce social protection laws so that citizens can hold them accountable in court.
“The President was addressing 23 APC governors, and more are expected to join the party. He should get them to adopt these programmes into state laws,” Falana said
Citing the Universal Basic Education Act of 2004, he lamented that despite statutory funding, Nigeria has 18.3 million out-of-school children, second only to India. “Many of these children end up kidnapped or recruited by criminal gangs. State governments must take responsibility,” he said.
Falana linked the worsening poverty to the removal of fuel subsidies in 2023, citing World Bank estimates that 7.1 million Nigerians were pushed into poverty, with projections rising to 10 million. He noted that while subsidy removal has boosted state revenues, there has been little evidence of improved welfare at the local level.
“We will start publishing how much governors have received since this government took office. Nigerians must begin to hold state governments to account, not just the federal government,” he said.
Falana also urged labour unions to ensure the enforcement of the new minimum wage, noting that many states were yet to comply despite increased allocations.
“From the North-East to the Niger Delta, poverty is fuelling insecurity. If we continue to ignore social protection, the crisis will deepen,” he warned.
Nigeria’s multidimensional poverty index indicates that over six per cent of the population lacks access to basic health, education, and living standards, a figure that has worsened due to rising inflation and joblessness.
