The Federal Government is set to stem rising food prices in the country by directing the Special Presidential Committee on Emergency Food Intervention to immediately wade in.
Assuring Nigerians that there was no food shortage, the government alleged that saboteurs were capitalising on Naira’s depreciation to escalate the cost of food items.
Femi Gbajabiamila, chief of staff to President Bola Tinubu and National Security Adviser Nuhu Ribadu convened the meeting at the behest of the President.
Placard-carrying women and youths had on Monday taken to a major road in Minna, Niger State protesting the high cost of foodstuffs. The protesters called on the political officeholders to save them from hunger.
In response, Kano State Governor Abba Yusuf met with the Information and National Orientation minister Mohammed Idris, who said that food items would be released from the National Food Reserves to crash prices.
Idris said: “We just rounded off a meeting. It is a special presidential committee to address the issue of food shortage or lack of enough food on the table of most Nigerians.
“What I will tell Nigerians is that the President has directed that the government needs to step in to stem this tide. Government will not fold its arms and see the way Nigerians are suffering in terms of the availability of these food items.
“Now, some of these will involve unlocking the foods that are available in most of the storage facilities (National Food Reserve) around the country. You know that the Federal Ministry of Agriculture has some food reserves. They are going to be made available to Nigerians.
“The government is also talking to major millers and major commodity traders, to also see what is available in their stores. To open it up, so the government will provide some intervention, discuss with them and provide some intervention to make this food available to Nigerians.
“What the government is noticing is that there is still food in this country. Some people are taking advantage of the situation, especially because of the high cost and the depreciation in the value of our currency that has led to the cost of these food items also going up.
“All these issues were discussed, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria(Yemi Cardoso) was at the meeting. The Minister of Finance and the Coordinating Minister for the Economy (Wale Edun) was there and of course, the Chief of Staff and the National Security Adviser were there. The NSA was there because of some national security implications.
“All these have been discussed and like I said, this conversation or discussion is going to continue.”
