By
Sa’adiyyah Adebisi Hassan
Nigeria spent Buhari’s eight years locked in a senseless debate over cattle ranching and RUGA, while the world raced ahead with science, technology, and industrial revolutions. That was the priority of a government that had no vision beyond grazing fields.
Then came another absurdity: bold criminals spent millions of dollars to launch an airline that never existed Nigeria Air, a fraud paraded with fanfare, logos, and photo ops, but no planes, no infrastructure, and no passengers. A country of 200 million people reduced to a laughingstock by thieves in agbada and Babanriga.
And now, the new gospel is “revenue generation.” Not wealth creation, not value addition, not human development just squeezing impoverished citizens of whatever crumbs are left for their survival. New taxes, higher tariffs, endless levies, all imposed on a population already crushed by hunger, unemployment, and insecurity.
Government or Robbery Syndicate?
Let’s stop pretending: when the focus of governance is only to collect revenue without creating value, what you have is not government. What you have is an extortion racket. What you have is a gang of criminals wearing the cloak of legitimacy, backed by the law to rob citizens in broad daylight.
Governments exist to build, to create, to expand opportunity. Criminals exist to loot, to drain, to destroy. Nigeria’s tragedy is that its government has blurred the line so completely that you can no longer tell the difference.
A Pattern of Failure
Eight years wasted on cows instead of classrooms.
Millions of dollars wasted on a phantom airline instead of hospitals.
Citizens punished with taxes instead of empowered with jobs.
This is not mismanagement. It is systemic looting, packaged as governance.
The Brutal Truth
When government stops being a platform for service and becomes a tool for legalized robbery, destruction is inevitable. No economy can survive when its rulers act like bandits. No society can thrive when leaders drain instead of deliver.
Nigeria is not short of resources. It is not short of talent. It is only short of honest leadership. Until that changes, every so-called “policy” will simply be a new scam in disguise.
So, call it what it is: not government, but organized crime with a constitution.
