1 A CRITICAL REFLECTION ON COVID-19 PALLIATIVE SAGA IN NIGERIA: IMPLICATIONS OF HUMAN GREED Oliver Ozoemena ONAH Spiritan School of Philosophy, Isienu-Nsukka, Enugu State. Abstract The Covid-19 pandemic that is ravaging the world has exposed both the positive and negative traits of the human person; it has highlighted the best and the worst in the human person. It has shown that human beings are capable of both altruism and egoism. As has become the case in recent history, Nigeria seems to receive the worst of almost everything. Hence, though Nigeria is not as badly hit by the virus itself as other countries of the world, the resultant economic effects are apparently more devastating on the Nigerian population than they have been elsewhere. This paper examines the controversies surrounding the Covid-19 palliatives in Nigeria. It argues that the Covid-19 pandemic and the subsequent palliative saga that emanated from the #Endsars protests in Nigeria have exposed the selfishness of most of our politicians and public officials. The main thesis of this paper is that the COVID-19 palliative in Nigeria was mismanaged as a result of human greed. Using the expository and the analytic methods this paper highlights the problem of corruption as it affects the distribution of the COVID-19 palliative in Nigeria. It concludes that the Covid-19 pandemic is a welcome occurrence in this regard in as much it is understood as a call for the re-evaluation of our values. Keywords: Covid-19, palliative, human greed, corruption, leadership. Introduction Every eruption of crisis, major or minor, comes with consequences which requires timely attention to contain. The urgency and the scope of the intervention are often determined by the enormity of the crisis. In material terms these come in the form of relief funds/materials which are meant to palliate the physical and economic effects of such crisis. The world was confronted with the reality of a new health challenge in the last month of 2019. News started filtering through that a new virus was wreaking havoc in China. There were insinuations that the whole streets of China were littered with corpses. At first there was confusion as some conspiracy theories linked the deaths with 5G technology. Among health experts the belief was that COVID-19 originated in bats or pangolins (Kandola, 2020). The first cases were reported in Wuhan meat market, from where it is believed the human to human transmission started. The world wished and hoped it remained within the borders of China. But gradually cases of the novel virus were reported in other countries, first, of Asia, but soon, of other continents. Ever since, the world has been engulfed in psychological, physical, social and economic torture. Nigeria was Aquino Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 1(2), 2021 2 not spared the experience of the pandemic and its social and economic consequences. The spread of the disease in Nigeria necessitated a lockdown which halted every social and economic activities and also occasioned job losses. Since 40% of Nigerians are said to be living below the poverty line, most of them surviving on daily meagre income, the lockdown brought untold hunger and suffering to the people in this category. Efforts by the Federal government and people of good will, both corporate organisations and individuals, to cushion the effects of the lockdown gave birth to the idea of relief packages otherwise known as palliatives. These relief packages were understandably meant for the most vulnerable of the citizens. Questions have, however, been raised with regard to who got the palliative and from whom. This papers hows that the COVID-19 relief materials were hijacked by the politicians and their cronies as a result of human greed. This work is organised in seven sections. The first section traces the history of COVID-19. The second section examines the Nigerian leadership and corruption in relation to the palliative saga. The third section deals with the distribution of palliatives in Nigeria. In the fourth section criticisms against the donation of the relief funds and materials through the CBN and the various governments are presented. In the fifth section we examine the distribution of the palliatives to show how they were hijacked. The sixth section is a critical reflection on the palliative saga and human greed, while the conclusion of the work follows in the seventh and final section. History of Coronavirus (COVID-19). Coronaviruses are a group of viruses that can cause diseases in human beings and in animals. The Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), which spread from Asia in 2002 and 2003 is a type of coronavirus. Hence the novel coronavirus was named (SARS-CoV-2). This virus causes the disease known as coronavirus disease (COVID-19). The first reported cases of human infection by Covid-19 were in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The World Health Organization (WHO) first learned of Covid-19 on December 31, 2019(WHO, 2020). According to WHO, while some of the earliest cases were linked to a wholesale food market in Wuhan, some were not. WHO subsequently declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on January 30, 2020, and a pandemic on March 11, 2020 (Kandola, 2020). Reported first in the city of Wuhan, China, the virus spread rapidly through Asia to the rest of the world. Nigeria recorded the index case on February 27, 2020. The victim was an Italian who came into Nigeria through the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos from Italy, and visited some other states, mostly in the South West, before testing positive for COVID-19. According to the Nigeria Onah A Critical Reflection On Covid-19 Palliative… 3 Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), all confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the country between February 27 and March 17 were imported by returning travelers (NCDC, 2020). By March 27, one month after the first case, Nigeria had 81 clinically confirmed cases spread across ten states. The NCDC report also had it that three patients had fully recovered, while one death had been recorded. The numbers kept increasing such that by April 5, the number of positive cases had jumped to 232 with five deaths recoded. The affected states had risen to 14 (Amzat et al., 2020: 219). This kept rising with lightning speed until the spread had covered the whole 36 states and the FCT. This occasioned a total lockdown of activities in the country. With more than 179 million infections and 3.8 million deaths worldwide as at June 30, 2021(Kandola, 2020), what started as a local health crisis in China has now wreaked enormous havoc on every continent of the globe. It has kept mutating, with more deadly variants emerging in some regions and countries, as in the case of the delta variant first identified in India. In Nigeria, as at June 24, 2021, the number of infections was put at 167,375, with a total of 2,118 deaths recorded. And while some other parts of the world are either on lockdown, considering it or are just beginning to relax the lockdown, the rate of infection in Nigeria has drastically reduced. According to the NCDC data, some states in Nigeriaare today COVID-19-free (NCDC, 2021). Nigerian Leadership, Corruption and the Palliative Saga Nigeria has been bedevilled by leadership problem right from her independence. This was aptly captured by Chinua Achebe in the opening sentences of his book, The Trouble with Nigeria. In his submission, “The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership” (Achebe, 1983: 1). He goes on to argue that nothing is basically wrong with Nigeria in terms of character, climate or physical features. It is lack of responsible leadership that has been the bane of progress and development in Nigeria. This lamentation about bad leadership was made as far back as 1983, that is, over three decades ago. Comparatively, it was a time when Nigeria was paradise on earth. This was a time when systems were still working; when the educational systems still produced graduates who were worth the name, when university graduates got jobs almost instantly. This was the time the economy was working, and the naira had value. This was the time Ghanaians were loitering the streets of Nigerian cities looking for menial jobs. Of course, Achebe lived to see that “there was a country.” If one could lament the poverty of leadership in Nigeria three decades ago, what should we say about leadership in Nigeria today? The failure of leadership in Nigeria is glaring in every aspect of our national life. In short, Nigeria today exists only for political office holders. Little Aquino Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 1(2), 2021 4 wonder why aspirants to such political offices stop at nothing in their quest to occupy such offices. This is because such political offices no longer exist to serve the needs of the people, rather they have become avenues for the winner to take it all. It is as if the most basic qualification for leadership positions in Nigeria today is greed. The problem of greed among Nigerians, which is most manifest among the ruling class, has actually dealt ruthless blows to Nigeria again and again. It is the greed of the ruling class that has crippled Nigeria beyond salvation, as it were. This greed explains why a particular individual would embezzle money meant for projects that would benefit a whole mass of people; money which not even his fifth generation could finish. This manifestation of greed among the political elite seems to act as a trigger for the populace to grab whatever they could from wherever they could. This is how the innate greed in human beings has caused corruption to trickle down from the high and mighty to the masses. Each one seeks the opportunity to have a bite of the national cake by every means, fair or foul. The level of corruption in Nigeria has made her an object of caricature and the butt of expensive jokes both home and abroad. It was not surprising, therefore, however shocking it may be, that the former British Prime Minister, David Cameron, was overhead describing Nigeria as „fantastically corrupt.‟ This was in a relatively private conversation with the queen and other political leaders at the Buckingham Palace (BBC News, May 11, 2016). The Nigerian President, Muhammadu Buhari, could only be shocked but could not but affirm the veracity of the comment. This he actually admitted to the Sky News Diplomatic Editor the next day (Punch, May 12, 2016). This was described by BBC diplomatic correspondent, James Landale, as a „truthful gaffe‟ as this corresponds to what they and many others knew about the country (BBC News, May 11, 2016). Widespread cases of corruption involving public officials (which details we may not bore our readers with since that is not the focus of this paper) only point to the greed which rules the hearts and minds of most of the political and public office holders in Nigeria. This greed appears to be innate in every human being but societal systems and structures could either suppress or aggravate this tendency in humans. Obviously, the Nigerian system nurtures and encourages the manifestation of this trait. This came to the fore in the distribution of theCOVID- 19 palliatives. COVID-19: Distribution of Palliatives in Nigeria There is no gainsaying that the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic threw the world into an unforeseen crisis. As countries were preaching and enforcing precautionary measures, the virus was spreading like wildfire. This forced a lock down of public places, including markets and churches. Social and economic life Onah A Critical Reflection On Covid-19 Palliative… 5 were shut down. This had, and still has, enormous economic consequences. Businesses were shutting down, employees in the private sectors were losing their jobs, and hunger was taking its toll. Expectedly, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that in 2020 the global economy, in terms of real Gross Domestic Products (GDP), shrank by about 3.5% (Alpert, 2021). In most countries, palliatives were distributed to the citizens to cushion the effects of the lockdown. These came in the form of food items and other essentials as well as personal protective equipment which were distributed mainly to the most vulnerable. Various countries gave out stimulus packages to individuals and businesses in a bid “to stave off economic free-fall as business [ground] to a halt due to the pandemic” (Snyder, 2020).Many developed countries calculated the COVID-19 stimulus package according to a certain percentage of their GDP, with Japan topping the list with 42% followed by Slovenia with 25% and Germany with 20% (Barone, 2020). These palliative efforts facilitated the bouncing back of the economies of these countries after the first wave of the COVID-19. Although the coronavirus infection in Nigeria was, and remains, insignificant in relation to the infection rate in other countries and continents - Nigeria ranks 86th in the world, according to available statistics (Worldometers, 2021) - the resultant economic crisis has been arguably more harshly felt in Nigeria than in other countries within and outside Africa. Just like in other countries, it brought in its wake hardships and unbearable hunger occasioned by lockdown of businesses, job losses, and other such effects. And, as always, the worst hit were the poor masses who constitutes at least 40 per cent of the population, with their number estimated at a staggering 83 million, according to a 2019 report (World Bank, 2020). As we already opined above, given the economic devastation wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic, any responsible government should be concerned about putting in place measures to cushion the economic effects of the pandemic in the form of relief packages. There is also the need to monitor how such relief funds and materials are distributed to ensure that no one who deserves such relief packages is side-lined in the process of the distribution. In Nigeria, there were efforts by governments and some individuals and corporate organisations to assuage the effects of the pandemic and its attendant economic crisis. There were donations from large-hearted individuals as well as business and charity organisations, both from within and from outside the country. According to Benson(2020), who cited the CBN as his source, 107 Nigerian companies and wealthy individuals donated the sum of 25.8 billion naira for COVID-19 relief as at April 2020.Topping the donors‟ chat were the CBN (N2billion),and numerous others, according to their capacity. All the telecommunications companies and commercial banks in Nigeria also donated generously to the COVID-19 relief. Aquino Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 1(2), 2021 6 Moreover, Obiezu reports that a private sector coalition known as CA-COVID “had collected tens of millions of dollars‟ worth of aid for coronavirus victims and given it to the Government (Obiezu, 2020).”All these donations made for the COVID-19 relief to the Federal Government were channelled through the Central Bank of Nigeria for onward disbursement. This seems to be the demand of due process, but it also has its downside. Criticisms/reactions that attended the donations There were commendations for these individuals and corporate organisations for their generous donations which were described as Corporate Social Responsibility. Of course, it is a great sign of solidarity with the masses of the people who are most vulnerable and would suffer the most economic impacts of the pandemic. However, there were also serious criticisms against these donations being channelled through government institutions. These criticisms were informed by the antecedents of corruption in the distribution of resources in Nigeria. The political elite in Nigeria have lost the credibility of the masses due to widespread corruption in government. In this connection, not a few people questioned the propriety of, and the rationale behind, making such interventions through the government rather than directly or through other means such as churches, village governments, and such likes. Not a few bank customers questioned, for instance, why their banks, would donate such huge amounts through the government where it would likely end up in the pockets of few individuals rather than crediting the accounts of their customers directly. Even with the explanation that for the banks, as for other corporate bodies, making the donations directly through the Federal Government makes for better accountability, and that “donating the money through the CBN is simply the most coordinated approach” (Benson, 2020) a section of the people still deem it selfishness on the part of these banks and corporate organisations. In this direction, Ariche, Ikegbu, and Amalu (2021: 54) argue “that channeling all the donated funds to the Nigerian government is a misdirected one due to its antecedence of unaccountability, lack of transparency and corruption.” In other words, the Federal Government has lost credibility to receive such donations meant for the poor masses because the people in government have, time and again, shown that they cannot be trusted with the resources that are meant to benefit the public. Were the donors’ intentions respected? A pertinent question to guide the direction of our argument now is, were the donors‟ intentions respected? Perhaps the reservations expressed by the naysayers was not unfounded after all when we look back at how the COVID-19 palliatives were distributed. It is noteworthy that some wealthy individuals engaged in direct distribution of the COVID-19 palliatives through churches or village governments. These churches and village governments were more effective not only because Onah A Critical Reflection On Covid-19 Palliative… 7 they are closer to the people, knowing who needed the relief packages more, but also because they are easier to be monitored and held accountable. With regard to the donations that were made through the Federal Government, serious questions have been raised about how the relief packages were distributed. The Nation Newspaper of April 29, 2021, for instance, reports that the Senate Committee on Special Duties questioned the Minister for Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Hajiya Sadya Umar Farouq, on how 32.4 billion naira allocated to her ministry was spent. She responded that only 2.4 billion had been released to her ministry. The Senate apparently acted in response to agitations by Nigerians with regard to the palliative care (Onogu, 2021). In the same vein, a press release by Action Aid on April 22, 2020 had it that a consortium of anti-corruption organisations, which includes Action Aid Nigeria, Centre for Democracy and Development, and the Centre for Communication and Social Impact) under the Upright for Nigeria, Stand Against Corruption campaign challenged the federal and state governments to publish the list of COVID-19 palliative beneficiaries (Action Aid, 2020). The consortium. This is another pointer to the suspicion with which the masses view every action of the people in government. The press release signed by Ene Obi, Country Director of Action Aid Nigeria, noted that there was information gap between the various governments and the citizens with regard to the palliatives in the form of Social Investment Programme (SIP), which comprises the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) and the COVID-19 emergency relief fund. The press release equally pointed out that the President directed that the CCT beneficiaries be increased from 2.5 million to 3.5 million. Although Ene Obi, in the press release, clarified that the CCT started in 2018 and should not be confused with the COVID-19 palliative, she insisted that they must be separated and specified so that each beneficiary knows what they are benefitting from. Moreover, the consortium challenged all levels of government to publish the value of money received as donations for COVID-19 relief as well as the list of beneficiaries. Equally included in their demands is the establishment of an easy medium of reporting corruption in relation to the distribution of the palliatives, prosecution of offenders and the inclusion of citizens‟ group in the palliative committee. This press release expresses the sentiments of a great majority of Nigerians. It is believed in so many quarters that the palliatives were hijacked by politicians. There are accounts of how these politicians stored these palliatives and were distributing them to their cronies. Some others found their ways into the markets. In Edo state, it is on record that most of the residents were not aware of the Aquino Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 1(2), 2021 8 distribution of any palliatives in the state. They even allege that the palliatives were hijacked by politicians (Eranga, 2020: 222).There is also a report that Lagos state received from the Federal Government 6000 bags of rice and two truckloads of vegetable oil for onward distribution to the most vulnerable in the state. This is in addition to a stimulus package unveiled by the State Government which was meant to reach at least 200,000 households (Agbedo et al., 2020). Yet residents of many communities in Lagos state bemoan the fact that they did not receive any palliative from either the State or the Federal Government. In every other state it was the same story of not seeing any palliatives from the government, and where they were distributed, the packages distributed as palliatives were laughable. There were videos in circulation on social media during the lockdown showing the discontentment of people who did receive the palliatives. Sometimes it was few cups of rice, few packets of Indomie noodles, a tin of tomatoes, and stuff like that. Oftentimes people were assembled under inhuman conditions to wait in vain for the palliatives. During the lockdown, the social media were rife with news alleging that the Minister for Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, Hajiya Sadiya Umar Farouq, claimed that every Nigerian had received the COVID-19 palliative. Even the Guardian news of Saturday August 8, 2020 quoted her as saying that “There is hardly anyone in Nigeria who didn‟t receive the Federal Government palliative care during the COVID-19 pandemic period … Hearing some tribes crying, especially the eastern part of Nigeria and the South- South that no palliative care was given to them tends to blackmail” (Agbedo et al., 2020). The report further quoted her as alleging that everybody in Nigeria, including the areas earlier mentioned, received the Federal Government cash relief in their bank accounts, and that only about 5 per cent, who were children, did not receive the relief package. However, on being quizzed on that, she denied having said so, arguing that “it is impossible to give palliatives to all Nigerians.” She said instead that “every State Government has received its shares of palliatives for onward distribution” (Silas, 2020). The nagging questions remain, who received what, and from whom? What did the state governments do with the palliatives allocated to their states? When were these distributed and according to what criteria? With regard to the above questions, some analysts have confirmed the widespread allegations that majority of those for whom the palliative were meant never received anything from the government. There were claims across the nation that the palliatives were hoarded. And people knew where! Hence, Nigerians, during the #Endsars protests, defied security agents to break into government warehouses and loot food items, which apparently were meant to be distributed as palliatives during the lockdown. This was long after the lockdown had been eased and people were returning to their normal activities. The question that this breaking into the Onah A Critical Reflection On Covid-19 Palliative… 9 government warehouses elicited bordered on the criminality or otherwise of these actions. However, most of the people involved in looting the palliatives were adamant and vehemently argued that they were taking what rightly belonged to them which were hoarded by the political elite. A certain Ojo insisted to VOA reporter, Timothy Obiezu: “we need our palliatives. It is our right. My neighbour almost died of hunger because of COVID-19. He used to work as security guard at a government institution, but he was sacked. What do you want him to do? I gave him beans and rice, he almost died of hunger” (Obiezu, 2020). Both anger and desperation motivated the masses who went about searching out government warehouses and facilities or homes of some politicians to loot these palliatives, or, better put, to reclaim what were looted by the political class. What else could be the explanation for such massive hoarding of materials intended as palliatives to be shared out to the most vulnerable when they were forced to abandon their means of livelihood and stay at home, even if temporarily, if not greed? Vivian Bellonwu, head of Social Action Nigeria, described this as unthinkable, mean, insensitive and a betrayal of trust (Obiezu, 2020). It certainly is a clear index of human greed. A Critical Reflection On the Palliative Saga and Human Greed Mahatma Ghandi once said that the world has enough for everyone‟s need, but not for everyone‟s greed. The COVID-19 palliatives represent an effort to make the resources of the world attend to the needs of the most needy people in the pandemic era. They were meant to benefit the most vulnerable population who work in the informal sector, such as the street hawkers, barrow and truck pushers, barbers, hairdressers, bricklayers, commercial drivers, and farmers, to mention a few. These depend on daily struggle for their daily bread, and most of them already live below the poverty line. Given the effects of the lockdown in the lives of this set of people, there is no gainsaying that they were in most need of such palliative care. But these palliatives were entrusted to the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, the state and the local governments for onward distribution. In this connection, the above words of Ghandi should ring in the mind of every right thinking individual who finds him/herself in a position to oversee the common resources. One‟s happiness in such a situation should come from the fact that one is used a channel to create happiness in other people‟s lives. But we know that the joy of having increases by having. Therefore, oftentimes people in such positions are confronted with the temptation to divert the resources meant for the public to their private use and enjoyment. This is the role of greed in human life and affairs. Unfortunately, this reared its ugly head in the distribution of the COVID-19 palliatives. Aquino Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 1(2), 2021 10 Greed is an animal tendency that is innate in every human being. But just like any other innate tendency that is not an involuntary process in human beings, greed could be mastered by anyone who cared to and worked hard at it. Of course, it is known that human needs are multiple and insatiable. The satisfaction of one need oftentimes gives birth to another need, and this could go on ad infinitum. This view was expressed by Marx and Engels (1947: 16-17)when they asserted that “as soon as a need is satisfied (which implies the action of satisfying, and the acquisition of an instrument) new needs are made.” Agbakoba (2003: 69) corroborates this thus: “labour improves in order to satisfy human needs better, but the fact of this improvement enables man to formulate other human needs.” This insatiability of human needs seems to work side by side with the instinct for self- preservation to elicit in human beings the acquisitive tendency which manifests as greed. But human beings are also social beings. The implication is that there are resources we must share in common. In an organized and civilized society such resources are provided by the government through what the citizens and the physical environment contribute in the form of taxes and natural resources, respectively. Hence, we must appreciate the fact that self-preservation transcends the confines of any individual to other members of the society. It is a refusal to keep this in mind that leads to excessive greed and obsessive acquisitiveness. And this played out in the distribution of the COVID-19 palliatives in Nigeria. According to Meher Baba(1967: 27), “Greed is a state of the restlessness of the heart, and it consists mainly of craving for power and possessions.”Understood as an excessive desire for resources, especially for property such as money, real estate, or other symbols of wealth (Taflinger, 1996), it goes without saying that greed always contravenes the demands of justice and equity. This is because, as Thomas Aquinas (1947: II-II. Q118)aptly put it, “one man cannot over-abound in external riches, without another man lacking them, for temporal goods cannot be possessed by many at the same time.” This view was re-echoed by John Locke (1932: Ch. 5) who opined that whoever acquires more riches (property) than is needed in his/her life is taking more than his share of the world‟s resources. That is to say that even if one acquires such wealth by dint of hard work, such a person may not be totally absolved with regard to the exploitation of other people‟s labour. Yet, strictly speaking such a person may not be validly held accountable for any crimes against humanity on that basis. However, there is a manifestation of greed that is purely a crime against humanity. Such is the greed that pushes one to embezzle and divert to one‟s personal use resources meant for the public. It was apparently to this tendency that St Augustine (1958: Bk XII, 8)referred when he asserted thus: “Greed is not a defect in the gold that is desired but in the man who loves it perversely by falling from justice which he ought to esteem as incomparably superior to gold…” Onah A Critical Reflection On Covid-19 Palliative… 11 The folly of unguarded acquisitiveness is that, as Adam Smith puts it, “the rich man consumes no more food than his poor neighbour. In quality it may be very different, and to select and prepare it may require more labour and art; but in quantity it is very nearly the same” (Smith, Bk I, Ch. XI: II). With regard to luxuries, however, Smith notes a very great difference. This only points to the fact that our basic needs are all the same. We however tend to rob others of these basic needs when we crave to multiply our luxuries. And, try as we may, we can never satisfy all our cravings. For “man is only partially satisfied in his attempt to have the fulfilment of his desires, and this partial satisfaction fans and increases the flame of craving instead of extinguishing it. Thus greed always finds an endless field of conquest and leaves the man endlessly dissatisfied” (Baba, 1967: 27). Therefore, one has to seek the contentment that comes from a heart that craves nothing since desire is the source of greed and every evil. Without this contentment, the temptation to take more than one‟s fair share of the common wealth would always be there. A pertinent question at this point would then be, who received what palliative, and from whom? As already shown above, majority of the vulnerable people, the poorest of the poor, for whom the palliatives were basically meant, did not receive any palliatives whether in relief materials or as cash transfer. This was in part as a result of uncontrolled greed on the part of the public servants entrusted with the distribution of those palliatives, and in part as a result of the failure of the government to put in place checks and balances in the distribution of the palliatives. This paper therefore recommends that strict measures be put in place for maintaining accountability and transparency in the distribution of resources in the country. The anti-corruption agencies should also be swift and impartial in bringing offenders to book. Conclusion This paper discussed the response of the Nigerian government and people to the COVID-19 pandemic in relation to its economic impact on the lives of the most vulnerable citizens. It argued that the set of people worst hit by the economic impact of the pandemic were those who work in the informal sector and depend on daily struggle for their sustenance. These were described as the most vulnerable people. The Federal Government and various state governments voted some amount of money and received donations in cash and materials to alleviate the plight of those most affected by the harsh economic realities occasioned by the pandemic. This paper focused on how these palliatives were distributed. Any responsible government which fulfils its duty of providing for the less privileged citizens also puts in place measures to check any irregularity in the Aquino Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 1(2), 2021 12 distribution of such resources. This paper found however that in Nigeria, there were no such measures put in place even when various groups called attention to it. As a result, some set of people, as usual, saw in the pandemic an opportunity to indulge that irrational and animalistic craving called greed. They hijacked and diverted the relief cash and materials meant for the poorest of the poor citizens. While they shared some to their families and friends, they stowed others away in warehouses; and these were discovered during the #Endsars protests. This desire to convert what is meant for the public to one‟s personal use we attributed in this paper to greed, an innate tendency in every human being which can, in any case, be mastered with much effort. This paper recommended that the government should put in place strict measures for maintaining accountability and transparency in the distribution of resources in the country and strict punishment for offenders. Onah A Critical Reflection On Covid-19 Palliative… 13 References Achebe, C. (1983). The Trouble with Nigeria. London: Heinemann Educational Books. ActionAid (2020). Press Release: COVID-19: Publish list of palliative beneficiaries, anti-corruption groups urge government. Retrieved from https://nigeria.actionaid.org/news/2020/press-release-covid-19-publish-list- palliative-beneficiaries-anti-corruption-groups-urge. Agbakoba, J. 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