In Kamuru, a remote village located in Zangon Kataf area in Kaduna state, Bitrus sits on a broken bench at the local health centre. He has been sick for days, but there is no doctor, and the shelves in the pharmacy room are empty. The medical personnel on duty look at him helplessly, but there is nothing they can do.
Bitrus is not alone. Across Nigeria, people are dying slowly – not just from disease, but from a government who has refused to provide and has misplaced priorities evident in its budgets.
In the recently signed 2025 national budget, ₦393 billion (about $249 million) has been allocated for 1,477 streetlights, at approximately ₦266 million per pole . That is enough money to build two fully equipped health centers per light.
Meanwhile, Bitrus and millions like him are left to rely on herbs, hope, or nothing at all.
This is not just mismanagement, rather, it is a statement. It says: “We see you, but you are not worth saving.”
A Budget that Shines Light, But Leaves People in the Dark
Civic watchdog BudgIT, flagged at least nine questionable insertions into the 2025 budget projects with little accountability. Among them is the outrageous streetlight provision, in comparison to the amount it takes to build a functioning primary health centre: ₦120 million, according to the National Primary Health Care Development Agency.
Imagine how many lives could be saved- the number of mothers that could deliver safely. How many children could get a proper diagnosis. But no, our leaders chose streetlights over important lives
While our leaders bathe city streets in glow, 133 million Nigerians live in multidimensional poverty. In 2024, youth unemployment “dropped” to 4.3%, according to the National Bureau of Statistics, but anyone who walks the streets knows that this statistic is not reality.
Last year, more than 20 young Nigerians died protesting about hunger and joblessness. However, their deaths barely made the news. That’s how normal this has become.
Who Decides What Matters?
Nigeria’s budgeting process has become a performance of misplaced priorities. Ministries are hijacked to dig boreholes, while health agencies scramble to save lives with crumbs. Year after year, funds disappear into projects that never break ground – or worse, never should have been conceived in the first place.
The National Assembly holds the constitutional power to allocate funds, but that power has been twisted. It is now a tool for personal interests, not national welfare. Why is the Federal Ministry of Health drilling boreholes? Why are contracts for ghost projects passed without public bidding? Why is the budget a catalogue of absurdities?
This is not incompetence. It is systemic sabotage.
Citizens Deserve Better
The sum of ₦393 billion could fund thousands of jobs, vocational skills programs, or public health systems. It could plant the seeds of local manufacturing hubs or subsidized food for millions. Instead, it is lost to vanity, cloaked in halogen.
Nigeria does not lack talent, potential, or people power. What we lack is leadership that loves its people. People like Bitrus deserve more.
A Call to Awaken a Comatose Conscience
Nigeria’s greatest wealth is its people, but it is being wasted. Undoubtedly, every life has value, and the budgets should reflect that truth. We believe in governance that listens before it legislates. In lights that shine where they are truly needed ,in operating rooms, classrooms, and minds.
This is not just about one streetlight. It’s about the light we refuse to shine on injustice. About how much longer we will trade progress for performance.
Although Bitrus may need a streetlight in the long run, a functional primary healthcare centre would serve him and his family better at the moment.
Nigerians must resist self interest and corruption , and focus on priority projects in its budgeting processes.