Dear Dr. Okonjo-Iweala,
No one is better positioned to support and advocate for the implementation of a Marshall-type plan for Nigeria. You are a former managing director of the World Bank, the successor of the institution that played a prominent role in implementing the Marshall Plan. You are a very intelligent post-graduate of economics from the prestigious Harvard University. You care about your legacy. You also care about your great heritage and your reputation as a world-class professional as well as the reputation of the great institutions you have been associated with, the World Bank, Harvard University, etc.
You have the ear of the president as his most trusted adviser and minister of finance. It is therefore your responsibility to give him the best advice that will move the nation forward. It is also your responsibility to resign if he will not listen to, and implement any advice you give him that can rescue the nation from the grip of underdevelopment.
As you are well aware, about 60 years ago, the Marshall Plan ended. Many of the war ravaged European nations and Japan that received aid through the plan, a $100 billion dollars aid, in today’s dollars, have not only rebuilt their infrastructures damaged during the second world war from ground and aerial bombardment, but have also prospered and are among the leading economies in the world today.
Since you have the ear of the president, it is your responsibility to persuade him to pursue policies that will be of benefit to the entire Nigerian people. For emphasis, if the president does not take your advice, you should resign and preserve not only your luminary professional reputation, but the reputation of the outstanding institutions that you have been associated with: Harvard University, the World Bank, etc.
Nigeria today is in a state of socioeconomic chaos and crisis as the Western European nations and Japan were at the end of the Second World War. However, our own infrastructures have decayed, crumbled, or collapsed not principally from armed conflict, but by neglect and corruption, with the damage caused by the civil war being an exception. Corruption has waged a total non-combative war on Nigeria and defeated the nation with such devastating socioeconomic consequences as:
1. 80% unemployment and extreme poverty in the population
2. armed robberies, kidnappings, and widespread state of insecurity
3. accidents on bad roads, lost productivity by long delays on poor roads due to traffic congestion
4. inadequate power supply causing relocation of some industries to other countries
5. tension between communities exacerbated by the struggle for diminishing resources and opportunities
6. poor water supply
7. poor educational, residential, and health infrastructures
8. poor competitive positioning of Nigeria for local and foreign investment and tourism
9. environmental and sanitation crises
10. rural-urban migration and congestion in urban areas from the neglect of rural areas
11. an underdeveloped agricultural sector of subsistence farming inadequate to feed 160 million people etc.
At the end of the Second World War, Western European nations and Japan needed the infusion of $100 billion, in today’s dollars; Nigeria does not!
What is the excuse for the parlous state of our infrastructures and the astronomically high level of unemployment given the fact that Nigeria’s federal, state, and local governments have a combined annual revenue of about $150 billion dollars?[$100 billion dollars from oil + $50 billion dollars from internally generated revenue] or about N22 trillion naira.
With this amount of annual revenue, the three tiers of government should be able to to adopt a robust and targeted social and investment related spending to build world-class infrastructures which will create demand in the economy for locally produced goods and services. This will transform the current cycle of poverty to a cycle of prosperity. Targeted annual government spending can include:
1. social security and compensation payments to 20 million senior citizens, special needs individuals, and victims or descendants of victims of the past crises in Nigeria : $20 billion dollars or about N3.2 trillion naira
2. 20 million part-time work opportunities for students in tertiary
institutions: $20 billion dollars or about N3.2 trillion naira
3. 20 million people in job training, internship, apprenticeship, and general work: $20 billion or about N3.2 trillion naira
4. National health insurance scheme of $20 billion dollars or about N3.2 trillion naira
5. 6 geopolitical regional infrastructure development agencies with funding of $5 billion dollars each, or about N800 billion naira each, to build and maintain the infrastructures, including enhanced security infrastructures, that will accelerate socioeconomic growth and the diversification of the national economy from oil: $30 billion dollars or about N4.8 trillion naira.
Suggested infrastructure development agency heads: Southeast, Dr(Mrs) Obiageli Ezekwesilie; Southwest Dr. Dele Makanjuola; Southsouth, Mr. Sonala Olumhense; Northwest, Malam Shehu Sanni; Northeast, Prof Leonard Karshima; and Northcentral, Prof Jerry Gana.
With such targeted government spending, with transparency, accountability, and monitoring in place, corruption in society will be reduced, the hemorrhaging of Nigerian economy via the laundering of the peoples’ commonwealth overseas will diminish, and socioeconomic development will take off like a rocket. Keynesian economics asserts this, the Marshall Plan proved it, and the Jonathan-Mark-Tambuwal-Iweala Plan will also prove it. With an addition of 60 million people with purchasing power and the nation’s infrastructures rehabilitated, Nigeria will attract, like honey attracts bees, entrepreneurs, investors, service providers, manufacturers, and builders of apartments and residential estates in urban and rural areas. Also, builders of world-class urban hospitals, rural clinics, commercial houses, holiday resorts and hotels will be drawn to Nigeria.
Tourists, in their millions, will also come to visit and enjoy our beautiful nation and pump additional billions of dollars or trillions of naira into the economy.
We will let ourselves, posterity, and humanity down if we do not apply all the God-given resources available to us to rescue humanity from the current intolerable conditions in our beloved country.
It is now time for action to in order to exchange:
1. effort for excuses
2. results for rhetoric
3. solutions for salvos at critics
4. performance for polemics
5. achievement for aspiration
6. and a vision for a vagary
Please persuade our president, the senate president, and the speaker to begin to implement this plan that will produce measurable and visible results of full employment, great infrastructures, and the socioeconomic revitalization of all six geopolitical regions of the country. The Marshall Plan accomplished these desirable outcomes in many countries. The Jonathan-Mark-Tambuwal-Iweala Plan can repeat this feat. Please make this your legacy and the legacies of our president, the senate president, and the speaker. Thank you very much for using your God-given intelligence, training, and experience to champion the implementation of the Jonathan-Mark-Tambuwal-Iweala Plan to rescue humanity in Nigeria.
Sincerely,
Abitunde Taiwo
abitundetaiwo@gmail.com