It’s giving urgent 2k

Borno is high-key hustling for urgent 2k

Good morning, Big Brains. Today’s edition might make you take your japa plans more seriously. At this point, maybe we should all take those plans extra seriously.

Word count: ~ 1, 000
Reading time ~ 5 mins

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Let’s get into today’s edition:

• Borno is feeling the heat of USAID’s exit

• The Nigerian Labour union might be going on another strike

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The Big Deal

Borno is feeling the heat of USAID’s exit

We need to come together as a country and select somebody to help us beg Daddy Donald Trump to release the United States Aids for International Development (USAID) funds he withheld because it’s messing up way too many lives, especially in Nigeria’s Borno state.

For over 15 years, Borno has been Nigeria’s number one beneficiary of foreign aid, no thanks to the devastating impact of Boko Haram and other insurgency groups. Now, with USAID funds cut off, the government of the state is hustling hard to find alternative funding to keep supporting the millions of vulnerable people who rely on humanitarian aid to survive.

Realising they can’t do it alone, the Borno government is now begging donors and development partners to step in and fill the gap.

According to Gambo Bulama, the Local Government Area Coordinator for the Borno State Agency for Coordination of Sustainable Development Partnership and Humanitarian Response (yes, we’re aware that it’s a mouthful), the funding cut has particularly impacted critical sectors like health, education, agriculture, and humanitarian relief. In Gambo’s words, “The state government can’t do it alone.”

Why is this a big deal?

It’s not every day we see government officials swallowing their pride to beg international donors for literally any form of assistance, but losing the single-largest aid donor in the world would do that to anyone.

Thankfully, some donors, like CRUDAN, have stepped up recently to provide clean water, food items, and cash assistance to over 25,000 affected households. While this is good news, it is a temporary fix.

Without major intervention from bigger donors, the humanitarian crisis in Borno could spiral out of control. Except Tinubu slides into Trump’s DMs and asks for mercy, the chances of getting USAID back seem blurry.

Before Trump’s decision, Nigeria was supposed to receive approximately $603 million from USAID. $368 million was supposed to sponsor HIV/AIDS programmes under the Global Health Program. They also planned to spend $73m on malaria control, $33.25m on maternal and child health, and $22.5m on family planning and reproductive health. The federal government has approved $200 million as its attempt at handling the USAID funding cut, but that’s not even half of what Nigeria’s healthcare system needs.

In Borno, for example, the number of people who had access to contraceptives dropped by 10,000 in February, showing the urgent need for the filling of the giant shoes left by USAID.

Even though Borno has more to lose than other Nigerian states, its inability to find aid still affects everyone.

Nigeria has the highest number of malaria cases globally. This means that 31% of the people that malaria kills every year are from Nigeria. Left to our government and its piss-poor healthcare budget, more people are at risk of dying because of malaria. We also have nearly 2 million people living with HIV. For those people, this is a freaking nightmare.

So, if you think Borno is doing too much with this global billing, they are not even doing enough. They need to be holding FG’s neck so we can figure out how to reduce our reliance on foreign aid.

The Nigerian Labour union might be going on another strike

Not to give you another reason to say, “God, why did you ‘brought’ me to Nigeria?” but the Nigerian Labour Union is threatening to go on another strike.

No, they don’t have a kink for nationwide strikes. The decision was inspired by President Tinubu’s declaration of a state of emergency in Rivers State.

Labour leaders argue that the emergency rule is nothing but political nonsense, calling it unjustified, unconstitutional, and a direct attack on democracy. They insist that suspending Governor Siminalayi Fubara, his deputy, and the state’s lawmakers who were all duly elected, is not just premature but a dangerous precedent that could destabilise other states.

So it’s either the president reverses the decision or gives Labour a reason to take industrial action that will bring the nation’s economy to its knees.

If you know anything about Labour strikes, you’d know that they mess with everything – electricity distribution, airport operations, transportation and literally every economic activity. It’s the last thing anybody should be looking forward to.

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This Week’s Big Question

”Which Nigerian politician deserves to be cancelled and why?”

Tunde’s response - “We should cancel Yar’Adua. He died when we needed him the most and gave room to these people.”

You can also share your response here, and if it’s as interesting as Tunde’s, we’ll feature it in the next edition.

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