₦airaland Forum

Think about it critically, one cannot call himself Middle Class he or she earns $7000 in Nigeria because most of the $7000 will be spent providing amenities that are provided by the government in other societies.

The Drum Major Institute, places the range for middle class at individuals making between $25,000 and $100,000 a year.
and that's in the US where many amenities are provided by the government!

yet RenCap calls people earning $7000 in Nigeria middle class!

@pointB
The questions on this poll are too subjective for us to come to any reasonable conclusion sir.

If you asked people a series of questions ranging from their income to what they spend, save and invest then we'd have a shot at having realistic answers.

This is an OPINION poll not a survey!

I sympathize therefore with those who would minimize rather than maximize economic entanglement between nations.
Ideas, knowledge, art, hospitality, travel - these are the things which should of their nature be international.
But[b] let goods be homespun whenever it is reasonably and conveniently possible[/b], and above all, let finance be primarily national.
- John Maynard Keynes (emphasis mine)

@PointB
You raised a couple of good points but the quote below is not the way to forward for Nigeria.

Indeed we need to perish the thought. Every keen observer will know that as far as Core North remains with Nigeria with their conservative and religious dogmas, many of the MDG goals will never be met. Polio is still prevalent in Northern Nigeria despite all best efforts!

Yes! there are a lot of problems in the north but they also have great potential. Don't throw away the baby with the bath water!

For suggestions on how to make Nigeria better please check out the thread below
https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-764430.32.html

Please endeavour to make a suggestion. No suggestion is too small!

Quote from seyi brown's post at the topic here https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-770551.0.html

Destroying This Nigeria –By Leonard Karshima Shilgba, PhD

I am not satisfied with the Nigeria in which I live today, neither am I proud of it. I want this Nigeria destroyed and another born. There is despair where there should be hope. Groups that should inspire have rather become hindrances of social and economic

growth. But why do I still write about Nigeria in spite? I do because people only run with what they read and understand; and if what they read has read them and exposed them enough, there is hope that one day the right spirit that makes great and enviable places shall take hold of their souls and give them no rest until their habitation becomes a place of praise.

STUDENT UNIONS: I have pondered the capacity of Nigerian students to provoke the right change, which shall make justice and the rule of law to hold sway. We have watched as Nigerian rulers have deceived us and taken us for fools that we give ourselves away to be. We have watched as our roads, both federal- and state-owned, have become death traps and claimed many lives, including those of Nigerian students. We have watched as huge sums of money have been sunk into public infrastructure such as electricity infrastructure, with worsening outcome. We have watched as our rulers have announced particular electricity generation targets over and over without accomplishing them, or even worse still, with overlapping targets, later targets being less than previously announced ones. We have allowed contractors with their conniving government officials get away with either abandoned public projects or poorly done ones, which get damaged no sooner than they were supposedly executed. We watch idly as our public primary schools, secondary schools, and tertiary institutions have suffered immoral neglect from our rulers while they send their wards to posh private universities both in Nigeria and abroad with stolen money. And I look around and see Nigerian students under the stupor of either cowardice or hypnotizing distractions, doing nothing even though public schools have remained shut down more often in one academic session than they are open to students.

But are we not crying more than the bereaved? If the Nigerian students, attending those rundown public schools, truly felt the pain would they not react? Maybe they love what they are “enjoying” and yet we, provokingly intruding fellows, are stressing ourselves for nothing. Maybe the leaders of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) know better than some of us writers, who are too blind to see that Nigerian students have been well taken care of by their governments (at federal, state, and local levels), who give some of them scholarships that are sufficient to pay their tuition fees in public universities and provide for their basic academic needs. I am sorry if I am too blind to see your comfort, Nigerian students. Maybe I am too blinded by my anger at not being selected by President Jonathan for a federal ministerial position so that I too would exact my national share. Maybe I don’t know that you students in public Nigerian universities also have access to the kind of quality library and laboratories that my students have. Maybe I am ignorant that you too enjoy regular electricity and water supply on your campuses that my students do. Maybe I don’t know that you have wireless internet campuses such as ours, where I teach at a private university in the same Nigeria you love too much to change. Probably each of you has a wireless-enabled laptop that my students have, and the type of projector-equipped and magic board-installed classrooms in which I teach in the same Nigeria you would not change. Maybe you too enjoy uninterrupted academic calendars that my students do, and could graduate within three years. Maybe your professors and lecturers are as comfortable as we are, but they are too fastidious, thus the regular strikes they embark upon. You must be angry at your lecturers for being ungrateful to your Nigerian rulers. Forgive me if both you and your lecturers have access to the latest research materials anytime they are needed just as we do. Probably your lecturers and professors, like us at a private university in the same Nigeria of your satisfaction, are provided with free laptops, Ipads, and regular and adequate funds to attend local and international conferences anywhere on earth. Forgive me if your schools have exchange programs with foreign counterparts and you interact thereby with your foreign colleagues for broader education and image boost of your universities.

Nigerian students, do you know that you can force your governments to act for the public good? Maybe you are contented with your lot in life. Maybe your certificates are yet being valued highly within Nigeria. Maybe the rate of unemployment is not high enough and so your attention is not turned to the “problem.”

Action Points:

If you are not satisfied with this Nigeria, then destroy it. The leadership of NANS should call for an indefinite shut down of all schools in Nigeria until they obtain practical commitment for the following:

i. Convocation of a national constitution conference that will result in true fiscal federalism and decentralization of executive and legislative authority (Items on exclusive legislative list, which compromise real federalism must be expunged). All schools, universities and tertiary institutions that have been taken over by the federal government must be handed back to their original owners.

ii. Appointment of Vice-chancellors must be made to have international outlook, with rigorous competition that should require candidates to present their vision, including how they could raise funds. In other words, students should insist on efficient management of universities and tertiary institutions.

iii. All federal roads in Nigeria must be repaired, re-constructed, or constructed within two years, and all contractors and public officials that have failed to execute road projects in the past must be publicly announced and prosecuted, and the funds received must be retrieved.

iv. The salaries and allowances of all public officials in Nigeria (who are presently less than 18,000 in number), currently standing at more than N 1.2 trillion annually, must be slashed to reflect the national minimum wage of N 18, 000 a month, so that the total emoluments of the highest paid public official is not more than 20 times N 18,000 monthly. To do this, they must picket the offices of the Revenue Mobilization Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) and the national and state houses of assembly.

v. New refineries must be built and modern railway lines should be built within a specified period of time. And there should be no increase in pump prices of liquid fuel until those refineries are built and railways are built to link up each and every state in Nigeria.

vi. Such demands that will create jobs and reduce cost of production in Nigeria should be made by Nigerian students.

We know that governments have taken control of leadership of student unions in Nigeria, and have compromised student leaders financially. But is there not a cause? Those so-called student leaders have lost the moral right to lead; can’t we have new leaders arising from the ash of the past? I can see a time in the future, if immediate actions are not taken to stop the downward slide, when there shall be coups in states in Nigeria. Governors of some states shall be overthrown even if the central “democratic” government stays. And the federal police and army who cannot contain the latest wave of violence in the land can do nothing to stop such overthrows. Then we shall have warlords in different parts of Nigeria. The provocation in some states is becoming unbearable; it is like the governors have concluded that they could do with their people as they will, and there would be no consequences.

Who was the richest man in the world 100 years ago? Who was the richest man in Nigeria 50 years ago? Do you know? Can you remember? Don’t you have to do some research to find out? But do you remember Martin Luther King Jr.? The civil rights movement in his day achieved much result because students were involved. He was inspired by American students. Oh yes, some of the school children were killed. But they still speak today. Money doesn’t make men, Nigerian students; rather, men make money. It is not all about money. I remember Segun Okeowo, a one-time Nigerian student leader. But I don’t know who NANS president is today. Since 1988, which national issue have Nigerian students stood for? Is their voice being heard today about serious national issues? Oh, I could carry a placard that reads, “OBITUARY OF THE NIGERIAN STUDENTS”. But shall we not experience a resurrection? We are tired of the inactive “solidarity” songs, that won’t lead to solidarity with national change. I am disturbed.

Let us destroy this Nigeria where justice is for the highest bidder. Let us destroy this Nigeria where politicians sponsor violence to achieve “profitable” political negotiations. Let us destroy this Nigeria where the judiciary has fallen prey to monetary persuasion, and the temples of justice have been turned into recreation attractions to the powerful and rich, to use to sell a dummy to the unwatchful patriots. Senator Wagbara, Professor Fabian Osuji; do you remember them? The first was a senate president, the second was minister of education. Few years ago, they were charged to court; the minister for seeking to corruptly pad the education budget and the senator for making corrupt monetary demands. That happened before I returned to Nigeria. The matter has not come up again after the deceptive “arrest and bail-setting.” Many such cases have taken place in Nigeria. Don’t think Mr. Bankole’s matter will be taken to a logical conclusion either. They usually die out with judicial connivance. The rulers are “arrested” when they have personal quarrels with their more powerful colleagues. They go and dig up a matter about which the more powerful rulers have had knowledge all along. Journalists are rushed to give a fake publicity. The travelling passports of the fallen rulers are seized. Bail application is filed. They are freed, and the matter dies. May we destroy this Nigeria!

Contractors are awarded public project contracts. They cut public officials such as ministers, governors, commissioners, speakers, and senate president some slack (in some cases, 30 percent of the amount paid). Worst of all, the project is abandoned, and no one is prosecuted because the hunter and the hunted have become bedfellows. I travelled on the Otukpo-Otukpa road in Benue state two weeks ago. I understand that contract for this road was awarded, but the money has been shared between the contractor and a powerful man in the Nigerian senate. It is an eye sore, with wreckages of vehicles testifying to the blood guilt of Nigerian rulers. Also, exactly two weeks ago as I write, I was stuck on the Ibadan-Lagos express way about three kilometres to an overpass leading to Abeokuta. Hundreds of cars and trucks were before and behind our jeep. I was driving to Abeokuta. I did not know the reason at first. Later, I learned that a bad spot on the expressway on our lane was the cause of the hold up. It was not possible to drive through the muddy divide to the other lane and head back to Ibadan. After being “detained” on the road for about two hours, I was able to find a safer channel through the divide; I drove over to the other lane and headed back to Ibadan. It was past 11.00 pm local time. I slept at a hotel in Ibadan that night. The next day, I drove to Abeokuta through the Akpata area of Ibadan. Have we not heard about “concessioning” and all that nonsense of this expressway for well over seven years? Yet this is the busiest road in West Africa. What a country!

When I drive on Nigerian roads and see how bridges on those roads are only being sustained by the mercy of God, I wonder whether Nigerian rulers are demons or humans. Less than two weeks ago, I drove on the Wukari-Jalingo federal road. There is a bridge over the river in a town called Tella. I took a look at this bridge, looked at the water below it and wondered how one could survive if his car is thrown inside the belly of the river by a collapsing bridge. About three days ago that bridge collapsed. My niece who was returning to Benue state called and told me that they had to sleep on the way. I asked her if workers were brought to the site to fix the problem. She said there was no one in sight. Even as I write, unless I fly to Abuja and then take a cab to Benue state, I must risk a drive through Plateau state from Yola to Abuja, and then to Benue state, all because a federal road of an oil-rich state like Nigeria has been shut down by the collapse of a bridge that was probably built when I was only a child. Let us destroy this Nigeria.

@seun
Do some research on Monte Carlo Methods in statistics and you'll understand what I'm talking about.

You can also read nicholas taleb's book "Fooled By Randomness"

@seun
If the population is homogenous then you can take 1000 out of 150 million and be fine.

If it was a biological survey, it may have some veracity.

An economic survey however is another kettle of fish!

The Nigerian populace is DEFINITELY not economically homogenous. In reality it is extremely skewed therefore this kind of sampling fails miserably.

I had a feeling someone would raise an issue about methods of survey but has anyone bothered to question modern methods of statistical analysis?

It should be well known by now that 2 conflicting views can be advanced by the same statistical data if one uses different statistical variables.

Another point to note is that most people think that if the total output increases then everyone is better for it forgetting that there are 3 measures of central tendencies the mean, median and mode of the distribution and even though the mean may increase with the total the median and mode do not necessarily increase.

e.g.
Case A: if 100 people make 1 naira, 2 people make 2 naira and 1 person makes 5 naira then total output = 109
Case B: if 102 people make 1 naira and 1 person makes 8 naira then total output = 110

from case A to case B, GDP has improved, but more people are poorer!

The Renaissance Capital survey was conducted with 1,004 middle-class Nigerians, residing in the cities of Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt, 70 per cent of whom were aged 40 or younger.

The survey made various findings on Nigeria’s middle class. Among them were the following: Average monthly income is in the range of N75,000 - 100,000 ($480-645, or roughly $6,000-7,000 pa).

A survey of 1,004 out of 150,000,000 possible Nigerians is DEFINITELY NOT a survey especially when it involves economic figures!
It is highly lugubrious that this kind of mis-information can be published by a finance house.

If $7,000 per annum constitutes the middle class then what is poverty?

Economic Classification should be based on livelihood not just income! if a person receives $7000 and spends $6500 providing amenities that should have been provided by the government, he or she has only effectively earned $500.

GDP measures the total cost of providing all the value produced in a country and is not a reliable yard-stick for measuring economic success.
GDP figures are greatly influenced by the stock market which does not produce any tangible value. By simply increasing the money value of stocks in a country, the GDP will increase whereas in reality no real value has been produced and no one's life (except possibly the 0.1% that own appreciable stocks) is better.

IMF and the World Bank cannot boast of making life better in any developing economy, the only people that benefit from them are the individual corporations (not even their host countries) that facilitate their loans.

All the countries that followed an IMF road-map are currently in serious economic trouble - Indonesia, Malaysia et cetera while the ones that rejected them in favour of building around their local economy are prospering - Brazil, India.

I wonder why developing nations are still listening to them!

The Renaissance Capital survey was conducted with 1,004 middle-class Nigerians, residing in the cities of Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt, 70 per cent of whom were aged 40 or younger.

The survey made various findings on Nigeria’s middle class. Among them were the following: Average monthly income is in the range of N75,000 - 100,000 ($480-645, or roughly $6,000-7,000 pa).

A survey of 1,004 out of 150,000,000 possible Nigerians is DEFINITELY NOT a survey especially when it involves economic figures!
It is highly lugubrious that this kind of mis-information can be published by a finance house.

If $7,000 per annum constitutes the middle class then what is poverty?

Economic Classification should be based on livelihood not just income! if a person receives $7000 and spends $6500 providing amenities that should have been provided by the government, he or she has only effectively earned $500.

GDP measures the total cost of providing all the value produced in a country and is not a reliable yard-stick for measuring economic success.
GDP figures are greatly influenced by the stock market which does not produce any tangible value. By simply increasing the money value of stocks in a country, the GDP will increase whereas in reality no real value has been produced and no one's life (except possibly the 0.1% that own appreciable stocks) is better.

IMF and the World Bank cannot boast of making life better in any developing economy, the only people that benefit from them are the individual corporations (not even their host countries) that facilitate their loans.

All the countries that followed an IMF road-map are currently in serious economic trouble - Indonesia, Malaysia et cetera while the ones that rejected them in favour of building around their local economy are prospering - Brazil, India.

I wonder why developing nations are still listening to them!

@E_force
I checked out your website and I'm impressed by what you guys are doing - Procurement Outsourcing.
You'll be in a good position to push the "Buy Nigerian" campaign, or at least influence your clients to do so.

I have a business solution for the procurement industry and I believe we can work together.
I have saved your details and will contact you as soon as it is appropriate.

I believe if Nigerian youths decide to exchange goods and services between themselves rather than buying foreign goods and services we will build a strong economy in spite of our huge challenges.

@E_Force
Yeah you are right about us having to love Nigeria and for that to happen we need to have a definite sense of purpose.

We need to come up with a defining purpose for Nigerians, something like "The American Dream" that Nigerians can look up to and aspire their lives towards.

When we come up with a theme strong enough to galvanize Nigerians irrespective of tribe or ethnic group, we will have accomplished almost 50% success in our quest or psychological re-orientation.

However, for us to have any shot at creating a unifying theme we first have to break the widespread and suffocating attitude of ethnic intolerance. One way (even though it's very expensive) is to start a media campaign that systematically breaks down the barriers that have been set up by the previous generation by asking subtle questions and providing answers that unify everyone.

One such example is to ask subtle questions about the Nigerian civil war and provide answers that suggest to our Igbo brothers and sisters that breaking away to form Biafra (which will in all probability be land-locked) will not provide a satisfactory solution to their problems but staying as one Nation and learning to live among their fellow Nigerians as bona-fide citizens of Nigeria will go a long way in solving their problems.

We can push ideas that suggest that a Nigerian with Igbo or Yoruba parents is a bona-fide citizen of Kano state and can become a governor of that state if He was born there or has lived there long enough to be able to interact without any language or cultural barriers.

We can push ideas that de-emphasize ethnic affiliations in favour of the Nigerian Identity.

A focused campaign will definitely cost billions but we can do[b] little little campaigns in our various circles of influence [/b] that will be more effective than one single huge campaign.

This is really great, I have reposted your write-up in the thread, Suggestions to make Nigeria better,

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-764430.32.html

We need more Nigerians like you!

Quote from E-Force in the "Sense of Purpose" thread

I Dream NIGERIA
Where were we (Where do we want to be)! Where are we !! Where are we heading !!!


Arise, O compatriots (A sense of equal right),

Nigeria's call obey (Be responsible to your Nation)

To serve our Fatherland (Labor and Produce),

With love and strength and faith. (Sense of purpose)

The labour of our heroes past

Shall never be in vain (Honor Ancestral Labor of ''Yester Years''),

To serve with heart and might (Deliver in Truth)

One nation bound in freedom, peace and unity. (Accepted by all)


I LOVE THIS ONE.

O God of creation (ONE that was in The Beginning)
Direct our noble cause;
Guide our Leaders right:
Help our Youth the truth to know (Nurture and Teach),
In love and honesty to grow(Maintain Dignity),
And live in just and truth (Maintain Peace),
Great lofty heights attain(Boundless Freedom),
To build a nation where peace and justice reigns (Labour with purpose).


I love my Nation, I love my Country. I am Nigerian. I just have one question and need the right answer please (Elders) . What is the purpose of Nigeria?

On the issue of Capital and Foreign Investment,

Capital is[b] anything [/b] that can be employed for the production of a good or service!

We don't need foreign capital for the development of local industries! Infact, once we use foreign capital, the industry, by definition cannot be a local industry. The foreign source of the capital will demand returns which can only be paid by repatriating the goods and services sold or the financial gains made by the sale of the goods or services produced.

To build a bridge, we do not need a foreign company! All we need are competent engineers that will employ available labour and resources to build the bridge.
For example, if a community wants to build a bridge, it can get a competent engineer, provide labour through the deployment of the youths in the community (remunerating them by providing them locally produced food, shelter and clothing) and pay the engineer by allocating him or her land from the community for private use for a particular number of years, or promise him or her food supply from the community for a number of years.
If money is needed for the procurement of materials not locally available, a regional bank can provide the funds (to be paid back by sustainably produced community resources).

The above method is not as easy as just borrowing money from a bank and paying the engineer but it saves the community a lot of heart ache, enriches the community, prevents the future generation from becoming slaves in the community by providing them locally owned means of livelihood sustained by mutually beneficial exchange of goods and services.

Nothing good comes easy!

India banned or at least restricted the influx of foreign cars a few years ago and today TATA an indian company are the owners of the Land Rover brand!

That is a great validation of the theory of economies based on local production of goods and services.

A system whereby, first class graduates of law, psychology and economics as well as other science students interested in nation building can be put together during their NYSC to tackle societal problems with various teams debating the various ideas put forward. In the end, the best and most affordable ideas can be implemented by the federal government with due recognition going to the teams that created them.

We can have a national list of challenges for which enterprising Nigerians can build innovative solutions with an expectation of reasonable returns on the investment of their time and other resources.

For Nigeria to be great, we need to solve our problems ourselves! we need to raise capital ourselves!

Going further on the case of ethnic intolerance. It is a shame that the youth of Nigeria have inherited this horrible nation splitting trait from the previous generation.

Africans seem to be the remaining continent where ethnic intolerance is the order of the day, little wonder why it is the poorest and most unstable continent.
In a world where everyone is trying to come together many Nigerians are still divided.
It is common knowledge that "United we stand, Divided we fall" yet for selfish reasons, many of us are still divided and view people not of our particular ethnic group as second class citizens of our community.
It is pertinent to note that this division does not stop at the ethnic level, it keeps going deeper and deeper until different strata or classes are defined even within small ethnic communities.

Furthermore, the only people that benefit from division are unscrupulous elements bent on subverting the common good of the community for their selfish and narrow interests. Little wonder that it is politicians that usually drive the wedges that divide us deeper.

I believe we should replace state of origin in all official forms and documents with state of residence / place of birth,
A person is a primary citizen of a place if he/she has lived and paid personal income taxes there continuously for the last 5 years
Only primary citizens can contest for political positions

THE criteria can get increasingly tougher as the scope of responsibility increases.
This will fix the problem of ethnicity because people of different ethnicity will be residing in a particular community and are bona fide citezens
Also it should be a crime to address someone else as a second class citizen of a place in any public communication if they are bona fide citizens

After the above law is passed, there will be a gradual re-orientation of the citizenry with the consequent reduction of ethnic intolerance.

This point of view was also elucidated in the last vice-presidential debate by Tunde Bakare.

creating a mechanism to remove leaders the populace is dissatisfied with is a very great idea but it must be carried out with great caution so as not to be abused by unscrupulous elements.

I believe at the local levels we can practice direct democracy such that people are organized into small units through which their protests can be registered.

I look forward to a day when one person can directly affect the Nation positively through the use of a technology enabled direct democractic process. This is a challenge that Nigerian IT professionals must rise up to.

@loco4love
Nigeria can get better if we decide to make Nigeria better. Nigeria is not finished. Nigeria does not need to break up. Nigeria is made up of many ethnic groups even within the same geo-political zone. with the Ife modakeke crisis, the agitation for an Ijebu state, the Ijaw-itsekiri crisis, the jos crisis et cetera, those are cases of in-fighting within ethnic groups. How does breaking up Nigeria address these problems?

Unity in diversity is a very great strength. The only draw back is that the strength can only be realised if it comes alongside maturity.

We need serious psychological re-orientation to remove the deep-seated ethnic intolerance that is a common feature of so many cultures.

The town hall meeting will be a really good idea if it can be implemented.

Perhaps an addition to that will be the setup of a monitoring system in conjunction with the media so that lies can be easily detected and exposed.
The sessions could also be deemed to be as sensitive as court sessions where lies would be taken as perjury with a risk of jail time.

@kobojunkie
please post the links of similar threads so we can find a way to merge them or direct traffic to the one with the most replies.

We start them because we really want to do something about fixing our nation and we are sick of just reading complaints.

I believe we all have a stake in Nigeria therefore we must all join hands to suggest ways to fix our nation.

On second thoughts, the more threads we have that posit solutions rather than complaints, the better for our nation because people will read solutions, refine them and people's dead hopes can be reignited to the point where we'll have a shot at changing our nation dramatically within a few years.

@kobojunkie
please post the links of similar threads so we can find a way to merge them or direct traffic to the one with the most replies.

The Nigerian situation is unique and peculiar as we have nothing working as they should, and instead of the constant bashing and non-stop complaining, why dont we suggest one thing( idea/policy) that we feel can make our nation better. I am sure as a result of Nairalands popularity, good/great ideas will find their way to appropriate authorities and hopefully it will spark a debate. Serious posts are encouraged, lets have a blueprint of ideas that may work for our unique land.

My one idea is that our legislators should be salaried like civil servants, I think this will to some extent ensure those seeking office are genuinely interested in serving the public.

The above was culled from a post by gamechange in the "what is the one change you would advocate to make Nigeria better" thread

oh boy, If I had seen this topic in time I would not have started a similar one,
I bet it will be better for you to move to my topic as we already have more than 25 replies (most of them by me)

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-764430.0.html

It would be really nice if we could get rid of all the corrupt politicians however they still have rights and the worst we can do to them (under the law) is to push for the EFCC to apprehend and prosecute them.

However civil groups can monitor politicians with a view to publishing their misdeeds. It will enhance the careers of the journalists that publish them while destroying the careers of the corrupt politicians whose names are published,

Supporting small and medium businesses is surely the way to go. One way to support indigenous businesses is to ban the importation of all unnecessary goods and services or at least tax them about 400% of their cost price to discourage imports.

Fixing the police force is definitely an herculian task because the rot is so deep and most policemen are psychologically battered. A better approach may be to create a parallel police force together with state and community police agencies. This way policemen from the Nigeria Police Force can undergo massive psychological reprogramming and worldclass training before they are allowed into any of the newly created police agencies.

How do we organize successful protests, not to remove the government but to press for meaningful changes?

Anyone who has been involved in the organization of a peaceful protest by unrelated individuals should please contribute so we can move our Nation forward

Please post your suggestions at the following thread:

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-764430.32.html

On the issue of education for northern youths, the government must act decisively.

One great problem the north has is that of the almajiris who have no allegiance and no kind of family structure except that offered by fellow almajiris.
Whenever there is any uprising, mob action is responsible for what happens among the almajiris, whether they'll act as fuel for the crisis or not. More often that not, they will because they are naturally prone to violence due to their high level of deprivation.

My idea is for the government to create massive almajiri camps where the almajiris are free to learn at the feet of their masters. Begging on the streets is an outdated idea and if the senators from the north do not alow their children to beg then no one should be subjected to begging in the name of religion. I do not think the concept of begging is even supported by the Qu'ran. It may be allowed but it is definitely not a compulsory duty to beg.

In the almajiri camps there should be food and water and the Mallams who teach sermons should be held responsible if their sermons incite the youths into any form of violent action. All the almajiris should go through an identification process and any almajiri on the street that is not registered should be apprehended and sent to the closest camp for registration.

The state governments should be personally responsible for the almajiri camps and various NGOs should monitor the disbursement and use of funds allocated to the various camps to prevent the camps from becoming massive wastelands.

The EFCC should prosecute anyone involved in embezzling funds meant for the almajiri camps.

This way, the almajiris have a better life, have better education (whether arabic or western) and will not constitute a societal nuisance.

WIN-WIN for everyone,

This highlights the need for community policing.

We should have state, and community police forces. One central police force cannot effectively police Nigeria.

In America, there is the FBI, CIA, NYPD and other state police forces and we have sherriffs that head local police forces. That's the tried and tested way to effectively police a nation.

That is one issue we as youths need to protest to the senate and house of representatives for. We should organize sit ins until the the legislative arms pass laws that allow for the creation of various police forces with different levels of jurisdiction.

Putting CCTVs in various places is a very good idea, and you are right we have the IT knowledge base to achieve it.

I would advice that we should engage our youths in the deloyment of the surveillance systems as this will kill 2 birds with one stone. We will be creating more jobs, for the local residents who would also be motivated to protect their environment, we'll be increasing our IT infrastructure and knowledge base and also providing better security alongside.

The remaining question is that of how to pay for such a large project.

My idea is that we can create a new economy around the project such that the project pays for itself.
One way to do that is to engage the residents of the affected communities in some sort of vigilante arrangement where instead of paying for local guards to mount watch at various posts they will pay for their sons and daughters to stand watch at designated control centers.

the community will be responsible for the sustenance of the security personnel.

A local police force could also be set up to support the surveillance team and bring complete security to the community

We have to look for a way to deal with the problem of Federal Charter,
One way to start is to redesign the federal charter to represent geo-political zones as opposed to representing states,
This way we'll have only 5 or 6 slots to fill based on the 5 or 6 geo-political zones we have.

Once the above is done then we can move on to merge ministries until they are less than 10,
With all the allocation that one ministry gets I believe it can tackle the job of 5 or 6 ministries by itself,

We should also push for the reduction of the number of senators and members of the house of representatives, I don't yet have any ideas on how we can implement this because we need to merge slots and that will mean that some senators will not come back to the house. It definitely will be an uphill task to get a sitting senator to sign into law something that may spell his removal from the house,

I reserve my compliments for whoever begins to articulate a pathway forward to get us out of the mess.

@bassetti

Check out the following thread to view and contribute to suggestions that can make Nigeria better.

https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-764430.32.html