Nigeria is a difficult country to manage; and one of the reasons is that we are subversive in nature. We hate to follow rules and we hate orderliness. A onetime local government chairman aspirant told me one time that he hated coming to America because of the strict laws and rules there. He equally told me that he liked Nigeria because people could do whatever they like without any repercussion. Imagine if providence could avail this man to win an election and becomes the chairman of Isi Ala Mbano Local Government Area. How will the administration of this man be; no question, he will become the purveyor of lawlessness? This man is not different from the mindsets of many political office holders in Nigeria.
Our behaviors are flawed in any aspect of human endeavors. Nigerians are too proud and why we have strong predilections for something we don’t produce bothers me painfully. Economic difficulties are not new to Nigeria; we have gone this road before and the question is did we learn anything from it? Just wait, let the price of oil bounces back and we will return to our old ways in a jiffy. When I was a student at Rivers State University, Port Harcourt, I learnt that oil was discovered in Nigeria by Shell D’Arcy in Olobiri in 1956. From 1956 to 2016 is 60 years of oil exploration, and later refining in Nigeria. Sixty years of foolishness and executive robbery.
For a period of 60 years, Nigeria has never in a sense of urgency thought about diversification of the economy. When I was in the university, I delivered a class seminar prior to my graduation thesis that there was no clear cut energy policy in Nigeria and I don’t know whether there is any one at the moment. Nigeria has seen the good part of oil revenues and if good people and not rogues that superintendented Nigeria then, we could have utilized those monies to take care of electricity, good road networks, paved walkways, bridges, and other infrastructures seen in other oil producing nations.
Some person fleeced our commonwealth to his or her pocket and to other nations of this world. We cheered these folks and none has been held accountable for the simple fact that all of us are in one way or the other rogues. The laws in Nigeria are weak and those who are supposed to help us, the crafters our constitution, the judges, the lawyers and the assembly members are all purveyors of lies and merchants of deceits. The masses are not better because they easily sell their birth rites for a paltry porridge. How do they do this: imagine Okon, a clean and conscientious politician comes to seek our votes? He has no money to throw around and he wants to truly govern, to help the masses, and indeed everybody. Tonye, a rogue, who as stolen bunch of money comes to seek our votes; he throws money around to buy us. The election comes and we voted for Tonye. We will pay the consequences and this is one of the factors why nothing is moving in Nigeria.
Everybody is bothered by the fall of naira and what is the lesson we are learning from it? Both the Nigerian government and individuals do not plan for the future. Some management theorists do not believe in planning, especially long term planning, chief among them is Henry Mintzberg. He believes in emergent planning while Peter Drucker believed in planning taken bits by bits. Nobody can foretell the future and that is why planning is sometimes problematic, still we need to plan. One of the best planning techniques is scenario planning as a strategy developed by some Shell employees.
When I look at our business men and women who delight in importing every rubbish from overseas, I weep for Nigeria. Many people questioned the wisdom of the central bank governor for banning the 41 items from sourcing foreign currency. When toothpicks are imported with scarce foreign exchange, we not only put pressures on the naira but we create employment in the exporting country. Can’t Nigerian business men and women produce this simple item in Nigeria and create employment to our teeming unemployed folks? Nigerian can import anything from overseas. We produce organic chicken in Nigeria but uninformed folks will import useless fertilizer breeder chicken from overseas, I think we are sick.
Nigeria produces baby products, but our prideful ladies will jet out to New York to buy baby products, thus exerting undue pressures on our local naira. When the American car manufacturers were pummeled down by Japanese car manufacturers, President Obama bailed them out with billions of dollars. He gave them mandate to retool to compete and after two years, some of them braced the challenges. Not only that those who took the federal bailout paid back the money but today, Ford, GMC and Chrysler compete very well with the Asian auto makers.
It is time for Buhari to give some time limit to our local industries to brace up and manufacture the essential raw materials in Nigeria or close shop. There are many Nigerians who can help the local industries in innovations and the development and management of the required core competencies to compete favorably; they are in USA and the European nations. Yours sincerely is one of them, but the status quo will not allow them to admit their flaws and weaknesses. Our managers and CEOs have been conditioned by the import disease; they have become lazy to know that innovation and creativity happen at the edge of chaos. Necessity is the mother of invention.
I have always written that nationalism is in lacuna in Nigeria. There are hordes of people out there, who are hell-bent to thwart the efforts of Buhari. As far as this narrow minded people are benefitting from the fall of naira; they will always cry hue on any effort the government of Buhari makes to firm the naira. The enemies of Nigeria have destroyed our school systems, ranging from primary to university levels; they have killed our hospitals and they have developed sharp tastes for overseas made goods. Now, they are finding it difficult to have cheap access to dollars and pounds, so that they can maintain their trips to Indian hospitals, summer holidays and pay school fees for their children. What happens to the general hospitals in Owerri, Abuja, Kaduna, Port Harcourt, Ikot Ekpene, Ibadan, Markurdi, Owo, katsina, Enugu, Calabar, Benin and Oturkpo. Why can’t our university teaching hospitals turned into real specialist hospitals with world class manpower and equipment? Nigerian medical doctors are scattered all over the world, they can be recalled if things work, security and other amenities in place.
Kill corruption, our schools can be what it used to be. Nigerian professors are scattered all over the world. Professors used to be in their own world; respect them and give them what is due to them and give them decent accommodation and university staff schools for their children; they will come home. Most of the Nigerian universities do not have the well qualified lecturers; some are half baked and some are promoted to professorship with just publications in back yard so call research journals.
Let naira be N400 to $1, so that our people can start paying visits to Obudu Ranch and Tinapa instead of Disney Land in USA and Dubai in UAE. States and Federal governments should start recalling our students in overseas for various scholarships; our universities should be improved for scholarship intents. The problem with the present foreign exchange policy is that those who need the foreign currencies are not getting them, the manufacturers. Banks are making killings in the present situations and Mallams are making fortunes also because they know how to trade in foreign currencies. Imagine buying at N197 per $1 and turns around to sell at N400 per $1.
If we have not learnt anything from the fall of naira, it is for us to look inwards and cut our coats according to the size of our clothes. There is nothing wrong with Made in Aba products; if we patronize them they will improve and the entrepreneurs will live good lives and employ some unemployed folks; that is one example. Some of the notable Nigerian professors went to our local universities. Tony Elumelu, the sharp entrepreneur did not attend any university outside the shores of Nigeria.
The late Moshood Abiola once said that no one hand cannot clap; and Ndigbo said when male folks urinate collectively, the foams it forms are great. As the late Uncle Bola Ige said, I siddon de look Nigeria; the fall of the naira is not a curse but an opportunity to learn and for us to get our acts together. I am using this opportunity to advise our president, to use fiscal policy responsibly to create employment in Nigeria. If government does not spend money, the economy will experience hiccups, but people should be ready to pay taxes.
Chukwuma Iwuanyanwu writes from Los Angeles