The way prices of things keep increasing without minimum wages increasing in Nigeria is quite alarming. Remember when a crate of eggs was N600.00 now if you are not with at least N2,500.00 you cannot even dream of getting your crate of eggs. It is quite exhausting as the once cherished ₦500.00, ₦200.00, and ₦100.00 notes are almost worthless. Taking ₦10,000 to the market these days do not guarantee you the simple recipe for cooking a decent meal as a pot of soup costs a fortune.
There is starvation in the land as most Nigerians can no longer afford the barest of the basic necessities of life. Most Nigerians can not boast of three square meals as the value of the Naira is on a daily decline. Civil servants and a majority of employees are not spared as the value of their take-home pay has drastically reduced. The saying now is ‘’take-home pay cannot take one home’’.
Most businesses have gone under as they cannot attract docent sales and at the same time keep up with the associated high running expenses. The worst hit are the artisans and the roadside traders who earn a living depending on daily patronage. This unending price increase has driven most small and medium-scale enterprises to extinction. For example, let’s say “Choima” owns a lip gloss business and her vendor keeps changing prices, today it is N1,200.00 per dozen, and tomorrow it is N1,500.00 per dozen; the prices keep fluctuating literally every week. This unstable and endless rise in prices is passed to the end users and over time, the end users who earn an average pay will either reduce lip gloss usage, seek alternatives, or stop lip gloss use thereby forcing Chioma out of business.
Nigerians are built differently as they are naturally tough with various survival strategies. They are ready for anything that comes their way as they are quick on developing alternatives to stay resilient. When the going gets tough they always get going. I am sure this mentality was birthed during the civil war where everyone had to fend for himself.
On the other hand, Nigerians are also seriously hell-bent on taking negative advantage of inflation and any situation. Iya Basirat who has had a bag of rice in her shop for three weeks already at a set price of N2,500.00 is quick to hike her price to N5,000.00 the moment she hears that the price will soon change. The fuel stations are not left out, they take the maximum advantage the moment they sense any form of scarcity as they will immediately start hoarding fuel all in a bid to sell at an exorbitant rate. Of recent, we all know how POS agents started charging extra fees in the heat of the Naira scarcity. They were boldly charging as high as 20%, which is unheard of but like some people would say, it is what Nigeria has turned them into. Some would probably say it is how businesses are run but Nigerians do not make situations any better. Give us a mile and we take a hundred. That being said, we need to look inward if any positive change will happen, it should begin with us as an individual always doing the right thing even in the face of adversity.
#EMBA28#
What’s Your Problem?