In ancient Rome, certain kinds of death were referred to as “the good death”. This means a voluntary desire to die a heroic death, such as committing suicide in the battlefield instead of surrendering to the enemy. This idea developed into the concept of euthanasia in modern-day medicare where a doctor is permitted to end the life of a patient whose pain and suffering is regarded as intolerable, subject to the willingness of the patient to die. Some persons take hard drugs and drink heavily to palliate their burdens; very much like whitewashing a cracked wall to cover the crack instead of rebuilding the wall with new bricks.
In medical terminology, to “palliate” is to reduce the intensity or severity of a disease or to ease the symptoms of a disease without curing the underlying disease itself. This entails administering pain-killing drugs to a patient to palliate the pain. To “palliate” in everyday language may also connote “to cover an error or an undesirable situation by use of excuses and apologies”.
When Shakespeare’s Macbeth was left to fight off Malcolm’s troops by himself in order to save his crown, he said, “Why should I play the Roman fool and die on my own sword?” In other words, he would rather not accept the idea of “the good death” by committing suicide for the simple reason that he would be glorified as a hero thereafter. Instead, he would persevere and confront the problem at hand and deal with it once and for all. He would not accept “palliatives”; and he would not give excuses for failure to act.
The Federal Government adopted a number of economic policies in an effort to reposition the country on the right trajectory following what was considered the ‘locust years’ of the immediate past administration of President Buhari. Some of these policies had turned out to impose untold hardship on the entire population, particularly the removal of oil subsidy and floating of the naira against the dollar and other foreign currencies. Prices of goods and services have skyrocketed. External loans, debt burden, and suffocating conditionalities from Breton Wood creditors have almost brought the Federal Government to its knees. The entire nation is now bleeding; and the situation is made worse by rising insecurity across the country.
Sequel to the reform policies championed by President Tinubu and in furtherance of his administration’s Renewed Hope Agenda, the Federal Government decided to provide palliatives to 15 million households to cushion the effects of subsidy removal. Experts have punched holes in Federal Government’s repeated adoption of the approach of sharing palliatives whenever crisis erupted. The same approach was adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic. Currently, the Federal Government plans to commence the distribution of 42,000 metric tons of grains across the country. Another 58,500 metric tons of milled rice from rice millers will also be released into the market.
If one argues against the use of these palliatives in a crisis situation, one is invariably saying what Macbeth said but in another form, which is, “I cannot kill myself”. Ironically, in these climes, because of the desperate circumstances poor, helpless citizens have found themselves, it would almost amount to suicide for suffering citizens to reject palliatives. The common parlance here is that “half bread is better than buns”!
Generally speaking, a palliative is an action that is intended to make the effects of a problem less severe but does not actually solve the problem. However, a scheme offered as a palliative for economic pain might harm the intended beneficiary. There are numerous cases in Nigeria and elsewhere where the distribution of palliatives has led to violence, destruction of public property, and death of citizens.
From recent history, the sharing of palliatives in Nigeria has always been characterized by looting of warehouses, burglary, communal clashes, general disaffection and breach of public peace.
To be clear, palliative is good. But having recognized the fact that it is only temporary succour and not a permanent solution, it becomes imperative to seek other complimentary options. There are more sustainable alternatives to sharing palliatives in times of crisis or economic downturn. One of such alternatives is the adoption of institutional framework and a structured social contract anchored on transparency and accountability with a digitized social register that is inclusive, reliable and authentic. The time has indeed come for Nigeria to develop a long-term social protection policy that is in sync with global standards while palliatives can be adopted as temporary interventionist schemes whenever the need arises.
*Anthony-Spinks writes from Asaba, Delta State.
