Nigeria faces a possibility of a people-led political revolution against its elites in the nearest future. 90% of Nigeria's foreign exchange earnings come from oil and oil only. The nation's financial security, life and the future are built on oil since the 1960s when this oil was first discovered in Nigeria in commercial quantities.
Nigeria has made more than $600 billion from oil sales only since the late 1960s, more than $300-$400 billion had been siphoned overseas into their private bank accounts in Europe, North America, South America, Middle East and the Caribbeans by the past and present Nigeria's leaders and top government officials without anything on the ground for the ordinary Nigerians to survive on and to also justify this enormous oil wealth and revenue.
Today, 80% of Nigerians are living in abject poverty and are surviving on $1-2 a day. Unemployment rate has reached over 30% amongst the youths leaving behind millions of young college-educated Nigerians without employment, hope and future. Millions of Nigerian workers in both the private and the government sectors earn poverty wages that will never allow them to meet their basic needs in life. Nigeria's national infrastructures, education systems and social services are all old, outdated, inadequate and collapsing.
The national population stands at 160 million citizens and residents, it is expected to hit 400 million persons in 2050 when oil experts expected the Nigeria's oil reserves that currently stands at 38 billion barrels to be completely depleted at the current rate of exploration that stands at 2.5 million barrels a day or 1 billion barrels a year.
The oil in Nigeria today has benefited only the nation's elites (serving and retired military generals, serving and retired security chiefs, politicians, public elected officials and their families and cronies, as well as retired and serving top government officials).
Can Nigeria survive without this oil money coming in on daily basis? Time is fast running out against Nigerian nation that has refused through her corrupt leadership for 40 years to manage and invest this oil wealth wisely for the betterment of all Nigerians and the future generations of Nigerians. Are Nigeria's leaders aware of this unavoidable event of the future as they are all very busy at the moment stealing the leftovers from the nation's coffers? Once beaten, twice shy. Time will surely tell.
