The latest Afrobarometer survey conducted across the country has shown that Nigerians’ assessment of their personal living conditions and the country’s economic situation has worsened dramatically over the past two years.
The survey indicated that the proportion of citizens experiencing moderate or high levels of lived-poverty has doubled since 2017 as majority of the people experienced shortages of basic necessities such as food, water and medical care during the year preceding the survey.
According to the survey, “Citizens’ ratings of the government’s performance on key economic issues including keeping prices stable, managing the economy and reducing poverty rates are overwhelmingly negative.
“More than eight in 10 Nigerians (85%) say the country’s economic condition is bad, a 27-percentage-point increase compared to 2020 while six in every 10 (62%) describe it as very bad.”
The report noted that the proportion of citizens who describe their personal living conditions as ‘fairly bad’ or ‘very bad’ has increased by 24 percentage since 2020 (47% to 71%).
“Nigerians cite management of the economy and unemployment as the second and third most important problems that they want the government to address, outstripped only by crime and security.”
