Last week, in yet another event that speaks to the terrible state of affairs in the land, a soldier stationed in Maiduguri, Borno State, expressed his frustration at being unable to visit his family due to the transport fare that he claimed was higher than his salary. In a video trending on social media, the soldier was seen expressing his frustration at his inability to visit his family after spending a year in the trenches. His words: “See wahala o. The Nigerian Army gave me a pass to go and see my family as I had spent one year in Maiduguri. As I left the bush, I reached the park and they told me that from here to my town is N35,000. I calculated it and going home and coming back is N70,000 and my salary that I was paid this month was N50,000. I don’t have any option again; I’m going back to the bush.”

Last month, the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), General Christopher Musa, lamented that some Nigerian soldiers earned below N50,000 monthly and called for a review. Speaking during an interview on Channels TV, the military boss said: “My soldiers collect less than N50,000 as salary in a month. We all know the situation on the ground. My appeal is for them to have a salary worthy of the work they are doing. We deserve to have that so that it can encourage them to want to do more.” The CDS also decried the allowances paid to officers and soldiers per day for being on the field to confront terrorists and others. He said: “The issue of cash allowance where we feed, any time we are on operations—I as a General, I am being paid N1,200 per day with my soldiers. From the first General to the last soldier, it is the same amount of money. That is what we manage.”

To say the very least, the wage structure in the military presents a scary scenario. Just how can a soldier be earning N50,000 per month in a country where a bag of rice currently costs at least N70,000? When a soldier on the frontline gets home after such a long time, (s)he will be expected to pick up the bills accumulated by the family while also taking care of himself or herself, including attending to health challenges. That being the case, it is depressing to realise that the wages that soldiers earn are not even enough to pay for their fare home from the war front. That means that such soldiers will be left virtually penniless when they get home and can only watch, aghast, as their children reel off their list of needs. Unless the country means to suggest that soldiers are not meant to raise families, this horrible wage structure must be addressed without delay.

Actually, all Nigerian workers, not the military or the paramilitary alone, need a salary review, and it is instructive that the Federal Government and the organised labour are still engaged in talks over the issue while workers literally scrounge and starve. Still, given the fact that Nigerian soldiers are putting their lives on the line defending the country, the current wage structure which can only engender poverty has to be reviewed immediately, lest the country pay a steep price for its maltreatment of the men and women on the frontlines. It is a no-brainer that those putting their lives at risk so that other citizens may sleep, as they say, with their two eyes closed, need motivation. Given the nature of their job, they should be well treated. There must be a salary review for the security services so that they can do their best for the country.

The ridiculousness of the current wage structure in the country, supervised by an apparently unconcerned political class reveling in luxurious living unrelated to real productive contributions and unreflective of the touted declining nature of the Nigerian economy, is amply evident in the plight of the soldier who is battling terrorists but cannot even travel home to see his family. Pray, what kind of society would pay a family man engaged in full service wages that are not even enough for transport home, let alone providing for the family? And what kind of citizen would such unconcerned, if not uncaring, society expect to make of its people? And to think that such ridiculous and uncaring wages are paid to soldiers bearing arms and expected to continue risking their lives for the country and sometimes even protecting those in government and presiding over the ridiculous system that subjects them to such shabby treatment!

It is instructive that the government did not set up any unwieldy committee before buying SUVs for legislators and awarding humongous funds for the upkeep of those in government even as it took years and some untidy processes, including the setting of multiple committees, before it could decide on the appropriate wage review for workers. We believe that the revelation on the miserly wages of this soldier says more about the country and the way it treats its citizens and workers and essentially passes a comment on the nature of the ruling class which runs the country in such a heartless manner. Unfortunately for the ruling class, the world has become a global village and there is no denying or covering up whatever happens in any location, meaning that the world today is able to see the true nature of the indignity that workers and citizens are subjected to in Nigeria.

Members of the ruling group have to do much more than accumulating resources to themselves and their families and run the country in tandem with the true interests of the people through payment of living and sustainable salaries to workers. That is how they can justify their hold on governance and make the country sustainable.

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