President Tinubu is obviously impressed by the many infrastructural projects Nyesom Wike has built in the last 18 months as the 17th minister of the FCT. A drive around the city reveals the extent of his accomplishments in the sheer number of roads and bridges he’s been able to build in such short period of time, and the man is sparing no cost in advertising his success. Since early May, Wike has spent up to N500 million to buy front page advertisements in major newspapers to announce the projects he’s completed which are ready for commissioning by the president.
The commissioning events are usually loaded with pomp and revelry during which the FCT minister will showcase his latest dancing skills. As governor of Rivers State, Wike built 12 flyovers in Port Harcourt, in addition to other road projects, and this helped to address the notorious traffic gridlock in the city. So far, the FCT administration under Wike has completed 150 kilometers of roads in both the satellite towns and the Abuja metropolis. Roads and bridges alone were allocated over N1 trillion in FCT’s 2025 budget. As an Abuja resident and a regular visitor to Port Harcourt, I commend Wike for his efforts.
In terms of personal style, Wike has created some impression too. He appears very foppish and tools around in a bullet-proof Lexus LX 600 SUV, which costs around $100,000 based on the manufacturer’s website. He also owns a 2024 Phantom Rolls Royce, a luxury sedan with a 6.75L V12 engine priced around $515,000 – $595,000 (N824 million – N952,000,000). To travel across the country, Wike flies in a private jet. His style makes a mockery of the World Bank’s theory that Nigeria is a poor country with majority of the citizens living in multidimensional poverty!
But if you look beyond the minister’s lavish lifestyle and the speed with which he rolls out projects, you’d find a city in a terrible situation. Over 100,000 workers of FCT are currently either on strike for nonpayment of salaries and other sundry grievances. The over 10,000 primary school teachers in the FCT have been on strike in the last four months, protesting against non-payment of salaries since 2023; non-payment of the N70, 000 minimum wage and other allowances like peculiar allowance and other benefits like salary increases. Another important set of workers, Primary Health workers, have also joined the strike, protesting against nonpayment of salaries since 2023.
In all, over 50,000 school kids in the nation’s capital have been out of school for 14 weeks because their teachers have not been paid in two years. At the same time, over 200 primary health centers which provide healthcare for the low income earners in Abuja have been shut down due to industrial action. Yet, our flamboyant Minister is commissioning projects everyday and spending millions to advertise them. What manner of country is this?
On Monday, June 30, the whole of FCT civil servants, under the aegis of Joint Unions Action Committee (JUAC), went on a three-day warning strike to draw the minister’s attention to 11 demands that include non-promotion between 2023 and 20-25; lack of training and others. ‘’We love the projects, the roads and bridges, but we, the workers should not be forgotten.
We are human beings and we are also Nigerians’’, the leader of the workers union said yesterday, as the protesters sang and danced near the FCDA headquarters, Abuja, on Monday. Under Wike, 500 primary schools and 200 PHCs have been closed down, leaving millions of residents without access to basic healthcare and primary education. It is a tragedy of immense proportion to which the media has paid scant attention. Such important news items have been crowded out by too many political juggling going on in the country.
I do not know if President Tinubu is aware of the rot in the FCT, and if so, what he’s doing about it. The president has been too engrossed in the politics of his reelection. Nothing else seems to matter. But some senior citizens of the FCT have chosen to talk about the decay in the territory. Elder Danjuma Tanko Dara, Coordinator of FCT Senior Citizens Forum, says the situation is a ‘’monumental failure of governance that has left the FCT in a state of social emergency’’. He added: ‘’This is not the Abuja we envisioned. While our children roam the streets instead of being in the classrooms, our sick and vulnerable are being denied basic medical care’’.
It important to point out that payment of salaries of primary school teachers is the responsibility of Local Government Areas or Abuja Municipal Area Councils (AMACs), as they are known in the FCT. Under the Tinubu administration, the 774 LGAs across the country, including the area councils of the FCT, have been receiving their funding directly from the FAAC, just as the 36 states and FCT get their own allocations. The sharp increase in petrol prices since 2023 have led to improved funding to the states and LGAs. Why then have the six AMACs in Abuja refused to meet their basic obligations to their citizens? Any nation that toys with the health and education of its citizens is a disaster waiting to happen.
The fact that these councils are now enjoying financial autonomy cannot be an excuse for some local politicians to pocket or stash away money meant for teachers’ salaries for their personal use. FCT residents and school children deserve pity and the workers who are on a three-day warning strike should receive the minister’s attention.