by Ademola Rabiu
_While mothers bury babies, graduates roam the streets and school fees chase children out of classrooms, Abuja’s answer is 74 more seats at the trough._
> *A nation in a coma does not need a bigger waiting room.*
Nigerian mothers did not ask for more chairs. They asked for a safe delivery room, a school fee they can pay, and a graduate child who finally gets a job.
Power really does reveal a person’s true colours, and these are showing early. We are told the National Assembly is weighing *74 extra seats* for women. A further *108 seats are planned across the state assemblies.* That means more salaries, more allowances and more convoys. Who pays for it all? The same mother you say you want to lift.
Senator, I have yet to hear you table anything serious on mothers and babies dying at birth, on support for jobless graduates, or on education drifting out of reach of ordinary families. And this from a lawyer, no less! A federal lawmaker legislating for federating units
> Representation you cannot eat is not progress. It is *parasitism disguised as representation.*
*Ask the Woman in Kaura Namoda*
What exactly does a woman in Kaura Namoda, in the remotest creeks of Bayelsa, or in the far reaches of Yobe get from this government? Is it a clinic with a midwife? A road an ambulance can actually use? A school where her children can learn without the fees choking the family?
Tell her which of the 74 seats will deliver any of that. She is not waiting for a lawmaker in Abuja to find a new chair. She is waiting for her next meal.
> *Her village will not feel a single one of those seats.*
*Bulletproof Tastes, Foreign Wheels*
Let us talk about priorities. Lawmakers in the 10th National Assembly were set to receive 2023 model Toyota Land Cruiser and Prado SUVs for all 469 members. The House’s own batch of SUVs was reported at *about N57.6 billion, roughly N160 million each.* Bulletproof vehicles were also planned for the principal officers. That was in a country where families skip meals.
And if ruggedness and armour were the point, why the obsession with imported SUVs when *Proforce has bulletproof, Nigerian-built vehicles sitting in its showroom?* A patriot is not known by eloquent speeches. A patriot is known by concrete action, and buying local would have been one.
> *Imported comfort for them, imported hardship for us.*
*Ringworm Crusades While Leprosy Spreads*
It is shocking that many of our welfarists and social rights campaigners now spend their energy and our scarce resources on ringworm while leprosy spreads wider. *Mothers are dying in labour* and children are dropping out of school. Graduates are idling at home. Yet the loudest campaign is for more seats, not more survival. That is the wrong fight at the wrong time.
> *Name the disease before you sell us the plaster.*
*What the Rest of the World Is Doing*
Other countries have found cheaper and kinder ways to help the masses cope with the prevailing global mess:
* *Finland* gives every expectant mother a state maternity package and free prenatal care.
* *India* pays poor mothers a cash incentive to deliver in a health facility, through its Janani Suraksha Yojana.
– *The EU’s Youth Guarantee* promises every young person a job, training or education offer within about four months of leaving school.
– *South Africa* pays a monthly Social Relief of Distress grant to jobless adults.
– *Brazil’s Bolsa Família* pays poor families who keep their children in school and at their health check-ups.
– *Germany* keeps its public universities tuition-free.
None of these needed a single extra seat in parliament. They needed priorities.
> *The world is feeding its people. We are furnishing our chambers.*
*Fix the Pot Before Adding Chairs*
Look at our streets, Senator. Mothers are counting every naira at the market. Graduates are idling at home. Frustration with this government grows by the day. A new seat in the Assembly will only bring your lady friends to the table. It will not put food on the table of an average Nigerian woman.
So please give them from the existing seats, for now.
Let the bulk of our national wealth go to people’s welfare, the real owners. That is what Ekiti voters sent you there to do.
*The overwhelming majority of Nigerian mothers are not interested in any amendment that raises the cost of governance.* Period.
They just want to eat better, live better, deliver safely, feed their babies, and stop agonising over their degree-holding children with nowhere to go.
Fix that first.
> *Feed the mothers first. Then talk about chairs.*
✍🏾 Ademola Rabiu, CEng
