Governor Mohammed Umar Bago of Niger State has said it is shameful that Nigeria is receiving grains from war-torn Ukraine.
Bago stated this on Tuesday at the Leadership Conference and Award ceremony held at the Transcorp Hilton Hotel in Abuja.
It has been reported that the Ukrainian government donated 25,000 tonnes of wheat as emergency food assistance to 1.3 million vulnerable, crisis-affected people in the North-East amidst rising inflation and food price spikes.
But the 2023 presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Peter Obi, said it was disheartening and a national disgrace that war-torn Ukraine is donating food to Nigeria.
Speaking at the ceremony, Governor Bago agreed with Obi that Nigeria does not have any reason to be poor and to receive food donations from Ukraine.
He said: “My boss, you are very right on what you’ve said. We have no reason to be poor. People may not like you, but they must hear you. What you say is the gospel truth.
It is time we tell ourselves the basic truth. We need to feed ourselves. It is a shame for people (sic) like Ukraine in war to be giving us food.
Nigeria needs to be productive. You cannot be out of poverty unless you start to produce. I’m not an advocate of handouts and palliative. I don’t believe in it.”
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Earlier, the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, said the federal government did not see anything bad in receiving donations from war-ravaged Ukraine.
He asserted that Nigeria’s current challenges and acceptance of grains from Ukraine do not make it a failed state.
