{"id":117931,"date":"2025-04-25T18:17:09","date_gmt":"2025-04-25T17:17:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/?p=117931"},"modified":"2025-04-25T18:17:09","modified_gmt":"2025-04-25T17:17:09","slug":"poor-leadership-cause-of-growing-poverty-in-nigeria-obi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/news\/poor-leadership-cause-of-growing-poverty-in-nigeria-obi\/","title":{"rendered":"Poor Leadership, Cause of Growing Poverty in Nigeria – Obi"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By Myke Agunwa<\/div>\n
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The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 general elections, Mr Peter Obi, has attributed the rising poverty in Nigeria to incompetent and visionless leadership.<\/div>\n
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He also lamented that as of 1990, when Nigeria had a Gross Domestic Product per capita of $556, China had $317, Indonesia had $578, and Vietnam had only $99 but, stressing that today, Nigeria\u2019s per capita is about one-fifth of Indonesia\u2019s ($5000) and Vietnam\u2019s ($4400) GDP per capita and below one-tenth of China\u2019s ($13,000). He said that Nigeria has more poor people than China, Indonesia, and Vietnam, combined.<\/div>\n
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Obi disclosed this on Thursday while delivering a lecture on \u201cPolitics and Change in Nigeria\u201d at Johns Hopkins University in the United States, at the invitation of Professor Peter Lewis, renowned author of \u201cGrowing Apart: Comparing Indonesia and Nigeria.\u201d<\/div>\n
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Sharing highlights of the lecture via his verified X handle on Friday, Obi emphasised that the fate of a nation is closely tied to the quality of its leadership.<\/div>\n
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\u201cThe failure of a nation depends largely on its political leadership. Competent, capable and compassionate political leadership, with integrity, will help nations to achieve sustainable growth and development,\u201d he said.<\/div>\n
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He compared Nigeria\u2019s trajectory over the past 35 years with that of three other developing nations such as China, Indonesia, and Vietnam, and pointed out that, while these countries have moved into higher categories of human development, Nigeria has regressed.<\/div>\n
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\u201cIn 1990, the year the measurement of the Human Development Index (HDI) was started, these 3 comparable nations, including Nigeria, were all classified under the medium category\u2026 35 years later, 3 of these nations have moved up to the High category of HDI while Nigeria has fallen into the low category,\u201d he stated.<\/div>\n
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On the economic front, Obi highlighted how Nigeria, which once had a higher GDP per capita than China and Vietnam, has now fallen far behind.<\/div>\n
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\u201cAs of 1990, while Nigeria had a GDP per capita of $556, China had $317, Indonesia had $578, and Vietnam had only $99\u2026 Today, Nigeria\u2019s per capita is about one-fifth of Indonesia\u2019s ($5000) and Vietnam\u2019s ($4400) GDP per capita and below one-tenth of China\u2019s ($13,000),\u201d he said.<\/div>\n
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The former Banker noted that the country now has more poor people than China, Indonesia, and Vietnam combined.<\/div>\n
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\u201cIn 1990\u2026 China had about 750 million people living in poverty\u2026 Today, however, Nigeria has more poor people than these 3 countries combined,\u201d he lamented.<\/div>\n
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According to Obi, the distinguishing factor in the progress made by these countries lies in their political leadership\u2019s commitment to development-focused policies.<\/div>\n
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\u201cThese comparable nations, and indeed other progressive nations, unlike Nigeria, have competent leadership with character, capacity and compassion, committed to prioritizing investment in critical areas of developmental measures; Education, Health, and pulling people out of poverty,\u201d he explained.<\/div>\n
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<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Myke Agunwa The presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 general elections, Mr Peter Obi, has attributed the rising poverty in Nigeria to incompetent and visionless…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":116751,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-117931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nPoor Leadership, Cause of Growing Poverty in Nigeria - Obi - Pointblank News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/news\/poor-leadership-cause-of-growing-poverty-in-nigeria-obi\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Poor Leadership, Cause of Growing Poverty in Nigeria - 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