‘Rice isn’t governance’, Atiku accuses Tinubu of using hunger for northern votes

By Omeiza Ajayi, ABUJA

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has condemned what he described as the deliberate weaponisation of hunger through the distribution of food items and palliatives across Northern Nigeria by President Bola Tinubu, saying the gesture amounted to political manipulation dressed up as compassion.

The attack was contained in a statement issued Friday in Abuja by Phrank Shaibu, senior special assistant on public communication to the former vice president. 

He specifically condemned the recent flag-off by First Lady Oluremi Tinubu of 100 trucks of rice and N1.2 billion in palliatives to northern states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

“What Nigerians are witnessing today is the tragic normalisation of poverty under the administration of President Bola Tinubu. Families can no longer afford basic meals, inflation has ravaged household incomes, and millions are being pushed daily into extreme deprivation. Yet, instead of addressing the structural causes of this crisis, the government has chosen the path of optics — distributing food in carefully choreographed ceremonies while the underlying suffering deepens,” Atiku said.

The former vice president argued that the crisis in the North was not accidental but the direct consequence of policy failure.

He said that since 2023, northern farmers had suffered declining productivity driven by the administration’s inability to secure farmlands, with vast agricultural belts abandoned to insecurity and food supply chains severely weakened as a result.

“Ironically, the same government and its promoters now seek to exploit the resulting hardship by turning food into a campaign tool. What the North truly needs are genuine, sustainable food security policies — not campaign lunch packs wrapped in party insignia,” he said.

Atiku traced the origins of what he called an entrenched strategy to the Ramadan period last year, when the president’s son, Seyi, conducted a widely publicised food distribution exercise across parts of the North.

He said what was then presented as charity had since evolved into a full-blown government policy.

“It is even more troubling that this pattern did not begin today. During Ramadan last year, the president’s son, Seyi Tinubu, embarked on a widely publicised distribution of food items across parts of the North — an exercise presented as charity but clearly designed to test the waters of this now entrenched strategy of politicising hunger. What was then an experiment has now evolved into a full-blown policy of optics over substance,” he said.

Atiku dismissed the palliative exercise as an insult to citizens struggling under the weight of rising food prices, unemployment and deepening insecurity.

“Let it be said without equivocation: Nigerians are not beggars to be pacified with periodic handouts while their livelihoods collapse. These are not problems that can be solved with trucks of rice; they require bold, coherent, and people-centred economic policies,” he said.

The former vice president laid out what he considered the standard of responsible governance, contrasting it sharply with the administration’s current approach.

“A responsible government does not turn hunger into a public relations strategy. It builds systems that guarantee food security, stabilise the economy, empower farmers, and restore the purchasing power of citizens. What Nigerians demand is not charity for a moment, but prosperity that endures,” Atiku said.

Aside from the economic dimension, he raised a democratic alarm, warning that the drift toward stomach-infrastructure politics posed a structural threat to the country’s political order.

When hunger is weaponised, the freedom of citizens to make independent political choices is undermined. When poverty becomes a tool of control, governance itself loses its moral foundation,” he said.

Atiku called on Nigerians to reject the politics of survival and demand leadership anchored on dignity, welfare and a secured future.

“The time has come to demand governance, not gestures,” he said.

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