President Bola Tinubu met with the 36 state governors and FCT Minister on Thursday amid the food crisis, rising inflation, and the high cost of living in the nation to propose short-term solutions.
Tinubu directed state governors to encourage local food producers to produce more and dismissed the ideas of importation and price control.
The rising cost of essential commodities has led to protests in Kogi, Niger, and Kano State, and governors in the opposition Peoples Democratic Party recently said Nigeria was going the way of Venezuela with increasing poverty and starvation in the land.
Nigerians in more states were embracing the call for protests against the harsh economic policies of Tinubu’s administration.
Aggrieved Nigerians lamented the increasing prices of essential commodities and how it had affected patronage of their businesses and called on Tinubu to end the economic hardship.
The president advised governors to take a cue from Kano State in dealing with commodity merchants hoarding food items for profiteering.
Tinubu directed the Inspector-General of Police, National Security Adviser, and Department of State Services to monitor warehouses hoarding food items across the country and stop merchant profiteering.
Tinubu also charged governors to pay attention to livestock development in their states and increase production, especially poultry and fishing products.
Chronicle NG reports that Nigeria’s inflation rate surged further in January, reaching nearly 30% in annual terms, owing to rising food prices and the country’s naira falling to record lows.