“Many Nigerians Are Sliding Into Extreme Poverty” – President Buhari Tells United Nations

President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday expressed concern that a large percentage of Nigerians population are sliding in extreme poverty.

According to Punch, Buhari stated this in a recorded video message to a virtual high-level United Nations’ meeting on trends, options and strategies in poverty eradication across the world.

The president said his administration was working hard to reverse the trend that sees the prospect of Nigerian population sliding further into extreme poverty, according to a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina.

He cited the recently developed Economic Sustainability Plan, aimed at stimulating the economy amid the COVID-19 pandemic, as one of the ways his regime intended to reverse the trend.

Buhari said the plan would extend protection to very poor Nigerians and other vulnerable groups through pro-poor spending.

The president warned that COVID-19 pandemic had the potentials of reversing decades of progress achieved in the efforts to eradicate poverty globally.

He said that was why his administration was taking steps to revive the nation’s economy in the wake of the pandemic.

This is coming after President Buhari lamented on Tuesday that Nigeria is in a ‘very terrible state of development’ with large population of poor people.