 As Nigerians grapple with the harsh realities of failed subsidy removal, President Bola Tinubo has mandated the National Economic Council, led by the Vice President Kashim Shatima, to work on palliatives for subsidy removal. We shall be analysing this this morning with Joe Fermi-Idanguero on the breakfast. We also will be looking at all the issues concerning the launch of Nigeria Air, which the House of Representatives has declared a fraud. The headlines this morning will be taking a look at the front pages of some national dailies without the press, where we have an analyst join us. Hello, good morning and welcome to The Breakfast on Klaus TV Africa. I hope you're up bright and early with your cup of coffee or tea, depending on your choice I am mooring. I'm Nyamgul, but I hope that you're open about and trying to go to work. So if you're holding your cup of coffee, you better be working on the road with it, trying to get into the vehicle. Life must go on no matter how much the fuel situation is in Nigeria. We must make that bread and put on our table for ourselves and our family to eat. And in Nigeria, having an extended family is just a normal thing. So you're thinking about yourself, you're thinking about your siblings, you're thinking about those uncles and aunties, somewhere we're just looking and hoping that you're going to do something for them. Well, Nyamgul, if we continue to consider the situation, trust me, depression, the level of depression that we're setting is something that we will not be able to contain. And it is such a harsh reality, which is why the president has mandated the NEC, that's the National Economic Council led by the vice president, to look into how to create palliatives. And they are talking about the poverty that's on the face of Nigerians. And they are calling on everyone to put politics aside and find solutions to this unacceptable, and those are his words, unacceptable level of poverty that Nigerians are going through. Yes, they should have done this earlier, but better late than never. He's now the president. He has started the work, the move. Let's see what's going to happen. The NEC, of course, comprises of the Thaddeusistic governors, the CBN governor, and some other co-opted government officials. So this should be a strong team that should be able to know what to do if they have the political will. And I assume that they should have the political will to do that. I particularly liked a statement that the president made. He said, we are all sleeping in the same house. We are all in the same house, but sleeping in different rooms. So we should leave politics aside. You could belong to any political party, but this is time for governance, no more politicking and all that. We need to remove our people from the abject poverty that we have found them right now, and we should work together. I particularly liked that. All of us sleeping in one house, but in different rooms. So whatever party you belong to, your PDP, APC, AFGA, Labor Party, NNPC, sorry, that's not a party. NNPB. He was, he was, he was done to union. NNPB, yes, you know. Okay, but whatever party you belong to, let us work together. And that also goes to people who follow these parties. It's like following a football club. No matter what they do, you are still following them, and you cannot see any wrong that they do. But this time around, after the politicking, where we find, we get some votes for our people, when they get into that place, all they need to do is govern. And what we need to do at that point is be the followers that will be objective. And our criticisms will be objective in the way we ask the questions we probe them. We just want the good of Nigeria, not just because we want to which hunt anybody. So this is the time now, we should start now to hold them accountable. What they do wrong, we should start telling them now. What they do right, we should also give them a pat at the back and say, you've tried. Yes. And as we do that, especially we journalists as members of the, you know, for the state of the realm, we need to do that with all the confidence possible with our rights protected, security intact, and also knowing that they are listening, they are watching. They, I know for a fact that the discussions we have are out there. All the discussions we have, they are all out there. The different television stations, the different radio stations, the different newspapers are being watched and listened to. These are how they get the feedbacks that they need. Because any reasonable, sincere leader knows that you can't depend on the people around you. You can't depend on the rates around because they will tell you what you need to hear oftentimes because they want to remain in position. And that is why I do not buy this idea that people sometimes throw out there when they begin to judge presidents or heads of states or governors and they say, oh, their aides were not telling them the truth. The question I ask is, their aides did not vie for that position. They vied for that position. And so they should take responsibility for whatever actions or inactions that are credited to them. Yeah. I do hope that the president now goes on social media and reads newspapers because you remember when he was campaigning at one point he said he doesn't go to social media anymore because the kind of things they say about him are terrible. So he doesn't need to read them and all that. But this time, I do hope that he goes back there and reads because no matter how terrible they are, there might just be some echoes of what is coming from the streets and it will help you make informed decisions what you need to do and how the people are perceiving your administration. So Mr. President, please, if you stop going to social media because people were berating you, people were saying all sorts of things about you, now you don't have a choice. You have to go back there and read up some things for yourself because like they say, aides will never give you the accurate information. You know, when you go to a governor's office, like some of the ones that I've gone to, they'll take all the newspapers and they will circle the ones that they feel are relevant to the chief executive, the governor. Circle them because he cannot read everything. So they will always take the good ones. They won't take the ones that they are criticizing him or they are seeing all sorts of things that may help him sit up and do his work. They will circle those ones and then present them to the governor. So even if he has to read, he will take those ones. He may not even have time to read all of those ones that they have circled for him. So he will take only the headlines of those things. So if a governor or a president says, I will depend on my aides, you may never get the information that you need to give. That is why any sensitive leader would cut the press because as I said, members of the 40 state of the realm, I've had the executive, the judiciary, the legislative, you know, the national assembly, you're talking about the press. We are the ears, the eyes, the nose, the lips of the people and so any leader who knows what he wants to do or has that ambition, the goal to succeed, you must cut the press, the members of the press at all levels. It's inevitable. It's a key factor that anyone who wants to succeed at leadership must consider. On a daily basis, it's like your cup of tea in the morning. It's like your water on the afternoon. What are the people saying? Even Jesus asked that question. Exactly. What are the people saying about me? Who did they say I am? So they should sit up. In my experience in government houses, sometimes you go there and you find out that, okay, yes, some government houses have some allowances for your transportation and all that, that at the end of the day, it's not ever enough anyway, because you're paying to that place every day, you're doing the work, some extra work, you're working under the governor. But you see the welfare of this journalist going with the governor everywhere he goes. Sometimes you see them that they don't even have water when they go out on assignment, they don't have food to eat, yet there will be money voted for the touts. Can I tell you something? Sometimes, monies are given to the PAs, to the aid of the governor or the president, and they siphon this money and they send the journalists out empty. I remember. That also comes to what you said that they should interact more with the journalist, because if the governor interacts with the journalist, whoever is given that money would know that one day a journalist will say something about it. I remember telling a journalist, a state house correspondent who was lamenting that, you know, whatever, I said, look, the pen is mightier than the sword, use your pen. All right, so let's go to our first up trending, and our first up trending today has to do with Jam, placing the evacuated students in Nigerian universities, talking about those who were evacuated, not just from Sudan, but Nigerian students who were evacuated from war-ton zones, exactly, get them into the Nigerian university system. And of course, modalities are being put in place to see to that. Jam is walking out the modalities and is planning to have talks with vice chancellors of universities to find out how they can harmonize the process and standards of getting them involved. Of course, you know that every university should have their own standards, but I think they are working at harmonizing it to make it seamless. I don't know if I hope that works, because some of these people that went out to study, maybe because they are studying, it's not in Nigeria, that's one. Some of them may have gone there because they didn't want to go through Jam at all, because Jam here in Nigeria, I'm not sure that's the process of entering any tertiary institutions elsewhere that you write Jam. There you go to the university itself and write aptitude tests and all the things that we do in Nigeria. So some people will just go out because they don't want the problems of Jam and any other thing. So these people may not have had Jam. These people may not have the course that they are studying outside this country. These people may have other things. The curriculum will be different from this one. So I don't know how they are going to to harmonize that. I don't know how, whether I should pity the tertiary institutions or I should pity the students. I don't even know, but I do hope that they will still get something out of this process and continue their education. And if it is some kind of learning that they felt was peculiar where they were, I do hope that they can find it here as well and be meaningful to our society. Well the need to adjust is inevitable on the part of the students. Life has happened to them as it were and things have changed. You must have to learn to adapt. The Nigerian education system is not as bad to the point that they cannot fit in or find a place to start off with. This is just for time. I'm just saying, for instance, if you don't have aeronautics engineering, for instance, in Nigeria, and that's what you're studying in Ukraine, and you come back home and you need to continue your education, what course will you be doing? Adjustments. Structural adjustment program. That's what's going to happen. You want to take a second uptrend? Well, Nigeria misses out or, as Canada releases, visa-free travel lists. Some countries can go into Canada visa-free, but it's not Nigeria. I'm sure if you check the people migrating to Canada, we will have more Nigerians than any other country. Yet we are the ones that will have, are not on that list. Yeah, Morocco is on that list. Seychelles is on that list. Nigeria has not made the list yet. Even though Canada has opened its doors more now, as the UK is tightening, closing their doors a little bit more, you know, saying that Nigerian students come into the UK to study masters should not come with their families starting from January of 2024. The Canadian government has made, has kind of loosened up or opened up a little bit more to people coming from Nigeria. So, yeah, one door closes, another window opens. We're not on the list for, you know, visa-free yet, but we may get there sometime in the future. Will that UK law work? Because a lot of people, a lot of congressmen, a lot of people who are opinion-molders are kicking against it because we fuel the economy. And we, you remember we discussed it, and one of the questions I asked is, one of the statements I made is that Nigerians traveling there are also contributing to their income. Education tourism is a huge source of income for the UK. Yeah. And you know, if they send Nigerians or limit Nigerians coming there, they are going to lose out. The universities over there are crying because they need that money that comes from, you know, foreign students. Why is it even that Nigeria cannot just wake up one day and say, okay, you do this, I do this too. You do this to me, do me, I do you. We should take the policy as well because when we're talking foreign policy, especially for the people who are just coming in right now, we should think about Nigeria first. And some of the things that may cause, have an advantage over other countries. In the first place, we have more, a better market in Nigeria than the UK. There are just like 60 million. We are over 200 million. So whatever you bring to Nigeria, it's money. And whenever Nigeria decides to do business with you, it's money. So even if we cut the ties with the common world, what are we really gaining from the common world? As members of the common world, people who identify as past slaves or past colonized people of Britain, are we not just like, okay, we are still paying allegiance to you because you have been our mother all this while. What else are they gaining? That is so, so important that if they keep cut the ties, we will die. We won't die. So you tell us your planes cannot come to Nigeria or Nigerian planes cannot come to the UK. We tell you that yours cannot come to our own country as well. I get the point. It is crucial. However, I did hear that also foreign nationals also at some point complained that getting Nigerian visa is not that easy as well. And so, yes, I've heard that complaint made. You said yes. You're looking at me like you don't believe that. Yeah, I've had that complaint made. But I get the point that you are saying, however, however, you must ask yourself, why are Nigerians being treated this way? If you do not place a certain level of value on yourself, no one is going to place that value for you. So if Nigerians are not seen to taking themselves seriously, if they are not seen to taking their own commonwealth seriously, if our people are politicians are looting our money and taking it to their own economy, building their economy against our economy, if a Nigerian is in trouble in their country or any other place and a government is not seen to rising to the occasion, to the defense and security of that Nigerian citizen, as you will see America do, you remember what happened when an American was abducted? How they came here in commando style and rescued one American citizen. But they are over the hearing of how thousands of Nigerians, hundreds are being killed, mass graves, mass burials. I think the government should sit up. They say Nigerians, not Nigeria now, Nigerians are treated like this because a lot of people are criminals. But what is Nigeria as a country doing? Right now, yes, for instance, may have committed a crime according to their laws in the U.K. But I can't see a U.K., a serving senator in the U.K., a serving parliamentarian in the U.K., serving time in Nigeria. Or someone from America, a serving senator from America, serving time in Nigeria. They will even do a prisoner swap. We've seen where at least that were even caught in the crime. Okay, they were carrying drugs and all that. And in that country, it was a crime. She was arrested and she was detained. And there was a prisoner swap, even with a deadly prisoner. But America did that because they didn't want their citizen to go through that, especially the person who has a name. Now, a Nigerian senator, even if we are applauding, well, whatever you did is the one that is haunting you right now. We might applaud, but we should also know what it has done, the kind of damage it has done to Nigeria. We got to put respect to our name in Yungo. That's just the starting point. We need to put respect to our name, to the Nigerian name, to the Nigerian passport. The minute we're able to do that, others will follow. It's just a natural process. Let me bring out my great passport and somebody looks at it and says, oh, you are Nigerian because they know that no matter what I am, because if you are a calcitrant child and your parents do not joke with you, nobody else will joke with you outside. And then you'll beat your chest knowing that you have parents that really care about you. People have got your back. Yes. So it makes you as an individual sit-up and be proud of where you come from, not just that I'm leaving this country because the country has failed me. The country has done anything for me and you go outside. You want to do anything and you know that they will not even think about you. Why are Nigerians living in droughts? Why are Nigerians? It's because Nigerians are living in droughts, the dachma syndrome thing, and as funny as it sounds, it's a very serious thing that home no longer feels like home. That home is not a place you're proud of, that you live to another man's land and you don't want to come back. I've heard politicians, people who should be leaders saying if you leave, it doesn't matter, you can go and all that. They kept saying people who are living can go. No matter how many people go, some people are still struggling to come into Nigeria and all that. I'm just looking at them. Are you serious? Anybody can go. Even one individual can change what Nigeria is seen to be and all that. So we stay here and then Anthony Joshua wins a march and we say that is our Nigerian world. And then the one that is already in Nigeria can go to hell. You don't care, it's not done. We'll still talk in Nigeria, we'll continue to talk Nigeria. Right now we'll give you the weather report so you know what to prepare for and how to probably dress as you leave home this morning. We'll come back after that to take a look at the headlines. This is The Breakfast, stay with us.