Poverty Reduction in Nigeria: A Religious Imperative

Abstract

The study explores the incidence of poverty in Nigeria which harbors some devastating
manifestations in the search for national cohesion and sustainable development. The
manifestations include: lack of adequate food and nutrition, high rates of unemployment, high
infant and maternal mortality. This poses the danger of compromising the harmony of the future
that would reinforce the elements of disintegrative tendencies such as conflict shocks, coup
d’état, brain drain, and child labor. The failure of government to alleviate poverty in Nigeria calls
for every sector of society especially Faith Based Organizations (FBOs) in creating innovative
new programs and partnerships in communities around the country. Hence, poverty reduction in
Nigeria has become a religious imperative of humankind. Accordingly, is action for poverty
reduction an integral part of living the faith? Therefore, this study intends to demonstrate how
FBOs have evolved informed interventions in basic health, education, and agricultural inputs to
reduce poverty pervading the nation’s development agenda. This study will achieve this
objective by focusing on the structural functional theory of religion using descriptive
phenomenological method. The finding reveals that reducing poverty is achievable through
socio-economic and institutional reforms, reduction of corruption, conflict shocks, and by
making poor people to directly participate in, contributes to and benefit from growth processes.
The study recommends that the war against poverty should be intensified through national
ethical values and good governance. This will ultimately bring about social stability, sustainable
development, and equitable distribution of resources.