Apparently pained by the alarming magnitude of poverty in the country and its concomitant crime wave and desperation among hapless Nigerians, the Senate recently directed the probe of the National Poverty Eradication Programme ( NAPEP) initiated eight years ago by the immediate past Olusegun Obasanjo administration. Citing lack of direction, administrative perfidy and the failure of the programme to register a formidable impact on the lives of the Nigerian populace, the Senate regretted the failure of the programme in spite of the alleged huge budgetary allocations made available to it by the Federal Government. But the authorities at NAPEP have swiftly responded to the call for the agency's probe, claiming that despite the noise over its failure to deliver, the Federal Government had only committed N11.8 billion to the programme since its inception in 2001.

Poverty has become so widespread in Nigeria that even most graduates of higher institutions now find it tough to get jobs. If poverty in the country is structural, as some analysts have argued, what is the cause? What has made it to be so pervasive and endemic? Is the poverty eradication programme the answer? We recall that the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, upon assuming office, had introduced what it termed a Poverty Alleviation Programme. Then in January 2001, in apparent response to the general dissatisfaction with the programme, the Federal Executive Council rolled out a replacement tagged the "Poverty Eradication Scheme," announcing a vote of N25.4 billion for its take off.

The then Minister of Information and National Orientation, Prof. Jerry Gana, explained that the changes introduced into the crusade against poverty were profound, adding that the new scheme had been redesigned to "eradicate absolute poverty". But the Federal Government had embarked on its war against poverty in a quandary without proper insight and adequate planning. Rather it established what it called " a Poverty Eradication Council" headed by the President and comprising the Vice President as vice chairman and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) as secretary. Other members included the Ministers of Agriculture, Water Resources, Works and Housing , Education, Industry, Power and Steel, Environment, Science and Technology.

With this , the scheme was hijacked by a new bureaucracy, and the process became a conduit through which party bigwigs could help themselves. While the poverty alleviation programme was a victim of unseriousness and lack of political will, the eradication scheme was literally a ruse, since it is impossible to eradicate what you cannot alleviate . For instance, how true is the claim by NAPEP that it has so far received a total of N11.8 billion only, after eight years, in a scheme that was kick-started with N25.4 billion in 2001, and despite successive annual budgetary allocations? From antiquity, governments have understood the effect of poverty on the attitudes and character of the general public, and therefore have tried to structure their forms of governance towards reduction of absolute poverty. Where extreme poverty was allowed to flourish, revolts and instability have commonly resulted.

Successive Nigerian governments, perhaps in realisation of this, have drawn up programmes to persuade the people of their willingness to tone down the suffering arising from poverty. Such programmes include, Operation Feed the Nation(OFN), the Green Revolution, Directorate of Food, Roads and Rural Infrastructure ( DFRRI), the current National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP) and scores of others at state and local government levels. The sad fact is that as the government on the one hand reassures the masses of relief, the same government asks them to tighten their belts, in accordance with the draconian policies often dictated by international lenders. Nigeria's experience so far is that these poverty alleviation programmes have been simply empty slogans. They have failed to bring about any meaningful reduction in the poverty and hunger that plague Nigerians, and this will continue unless the government shows more commitment to their implementation. How can poverty be reduced when agriculture, the nation's highest employer of labour, still suffers neglect by the government? How much of the annual budgets go to agriculture?

In a country where only the poor traditionally farm, it is a moral imperative for the government to see the fight against poverty as a necessary national project to establish itself in the minds of the people and to score higher international ranking. Government must, for a start, encourage people to return to the land.

Besides providing essential infrastructure to stimulate economic growth, government should revive the various plantations of cocoa, oil palm, groundnuts, cashew, rubber and rice that sustained the economy before the discovery of petroleum. Above all, Nigerians must strive to attract the support of advanced countries in ensuring an industrial acceleration.

We must note that not only was China's industrial revolution instigated by the state as owner and supporter of profit-making enterprises, that country's recent economic boom has also been fuelled by huge amounts of foreign direct investment. Enough of the ad hoc or cosmetic approach to poverty alleviation. While probing NAPEP, we must confront the menace head on.