Protests: Presidential committee meets on food prices, accessibility

Protests: Presidential committee meets on food prices, accessibility

Following the recent protests in some parts of the country over geometric increase in the price of food, President Bola Tinubu has directed the Presidential Committee on Emergency Food Intervention to work out immediate measures to address the situation .

Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, disclosed this after a committee meeting on Tuesday in Abuja.

The minister said the president was concerned about the accessibility and affordability of food items nationwide.

“The government is very concerned about what Nigerians are going through, especially what happened in Minna yesterday.

“Therefore, the government is taking some actions to ensure that Nigerians have some relief in terms of the availability of food on the table,” said Mr Idris.

Mr Idris said the committee meeting would continue until Thursday, adding that certain significant measures are already being considered to ease the deplorable situation.

“Now, some of these will involve unlocking the foods available in most of the storage facilities (National Food Reserves) around the country.

“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 that government will provide some intervention, discuss with them to provide some intervention to make this food available to Nigerians,” the minister said.

He said the government was aware that some persons were creating food shortages because of its high cost and currency depreciation.

“What I will tell Nigerians is that the president has directed that government needs to step in to stem this tide.⁣

“The government will not fold its arms and see the way Nigerians are suffering in terms of the availability of these food items, so I want to plead with you to understand the government.

“By the time these meetings are concluded, we’ll be able to issue a definite statement on the position of government in this regard,” the minister said.

The meeting was attended by the Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, Central Bank governor, Yemi Cardoso, Minister of Finance, Wale Edun, and the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu.

Others are Minister of Agriculture Abubakar Kyari, Budget and Economic Planning Bagudu Atiku, and Ministers of State for Agriculture Sabi Abdullahi and FCT Mariya Mahmoud.