Mustapha Lawal
Claim
A Twitter user (CBN Gov Akinsola Akin; @cbngov_akin1) claimed to have posted another piece of evidence that Peter Obi increased the poverty rate of Anambra State while he was governor of the state.
Verdict
True! According to data from The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) Anambra state-level headcount per capita poverty, the measure increased from 41.4% in 2003-04 to 53.7% in 2009-10. Peter Obi was governor between 2006 and 2014.
Full Text
A Twitter user @cbngov_akin1 tweeted three screenshots (one of Stati sense, one of a Google search page and a tweet of the current Anambra state current governor: Charles Soludo, from Nov 2022) and claimed it to be evidence that the Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi increased the poverty rate in Anambra state while he was governor.
The tweet which has garnered over 65.7k views, 54 retweets and 112 likes as of the time of this report can be found here.
The screenshot from Stati Sense was a tweet from November 2022 showing Anambra state poverty rate in 4 years (1996, 2003, 2010 and 2019) quoting an NBS source.
And the governor’s tweet was from a long thread of tweets titled “History Beckons and I will not be Silent (Part 1)” posted on 14th November 2022 by Governor Chukwuma Charles Soludo, CFR.
The Labour Party candidate, Peter Obi served as governor of Anambra state from March to November 2006, February to May 2007, and June 2007 to March 2014 preceded by Chris Ngige and succeeded by Willie Obano amidst a series of court cases and impeachment.
Peter Obi’s performance as Governor of Anambra state has been under open eye since he declared for the presidency (which he came third at the Feb 25th poll as declared by INEC) just like every other candidate and as part of his campaign promises, he had promised to take many Nigerians out of poverty.
According to Oecd data, the poverty rate is the ratio of the number of people whose income falls below the poverty line. Poverty is multidimensional and no single indicator can capture all the aspects of poverty. The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), is the agency of the Federal Government of Nigeria responsible for collecting, compiling, analyzing, interpreting, publishing and disseminating statistical information relating to the socio-economic life and conditions of the people of Nigeria.
Verification
Findings by FactCheckElections revealed The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) National Poverty Rates For Nigeria: 2003-04 (Revised) And 2009-10 (Abridged Report). The report showed that Anambra State had 41.4% state-level headcount per capita poverty measure in 2003-04 and 53.7% in 2009-10.
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) National Poverty Rates For Nigeria: 2003-04 (Revised) And 2009-10 (Abridged Report) captures poverty rates across Nigeria with the Absolute Poverty Approach (using a per capita approach of assigning 3000 calories requirement for an adult).
FactcheckElection can find no report of official data on the poverty rate between the year 2011 – 2018. Aside from forecasts and predictions, there’s no absolute poverty study in those years. According to a reply tweet by Dr Yemi Kale (former statistician general of Nigeria), “NBS has not conducted any absolute poverty study since 2009”.
However, there is a 2019 Poverty & Inequality in Nigeria report published by the NBS. The report showed Anambra had a poverty rate of 14.78%.
Conclusion
True! According to data from The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) Anambra state-level headcount per capita poverty, the measure increased from 41.4% in 2003-04 to 53.7% in 2009-10. Peter Obi was governor between 2006 and 2014. However, there is no official data to show the level of poverty rate at the time he left office in 2014.