Nigeria’s consumer inflation rate quickened for the first time in a year in March with headline consumer inflation rising to 15.38% year-on-year, up from 15.06% in February, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) figures.
Food inflation accelerated to 14.31% year-on-year, up from 12.12%.
Analysts say this inflation spiral is a headache for President Bola Tinubu’s government ahead of elections scheduled for January next year.
Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation had started to get price pressures under control before the the United States and its ally, Israel, jointly launched attacks on Iran snowballing into a full scale war. Inflation had been falling for 11 straight months.
But the Middle East war has triggered a surge in domestic fuel prices, which has resulted into food inflation, typically the main driver of the headline rate.
Commercial bus drivers and food stuff sellers at a popular market in Ile Epo, a Lagos suburb, told themorninstar.com.ng at the weekend that higher fuel costs were driving up the cost of everything making lives much harder and miserable.
“We pay four times more than what we used to pay for fuel to get passengers and goods to this market. We have to pass the burden onto the passengers who in turn pass it to the final consumers,” Chidi, a danfo driver said.
Displaying a cement bag containing items she said she bought for N55,000 in the market, Esther Ade, a civil servant, said the situation is gradually slipping out of hand. “I am a salary earner and I have four kids. Two are already in tertiary institutions while the other two will write JAMB coming up soon. Coping with feeding cost is a big challenge. The time has come for President Tinubu to step in, not necessarily restoring fuel subsidy but thinking deep on how to support the average Nigerian families now living from hands to mouth. The fate of over 200 million Nigerians should certainly not be left to the whims and caprices of market forces,” she said.
She lamented that the army of corporate beggars have now grown big.
