By Ebun Asagbe<\/p>\n
Philomath<\/p>\n
Everyone who puts pen to paper, who deigns to call himself a writer must
\nfirst be a lover of knowledge. When all is said and done, what you write
\nshould be an outpouring of what you have learnt to be true and right, and
\nmost importantly, accurate. It is here that I have found The Economist\u2019s
\nblog, The Economist Explains lacking.<\/p>\n
Usually, when one sees the word \u2018explain\u2019, the expectation is that clarity
\nand understanding of the facts are in the works. Not so for this article
\nwritten, and more annoying, published by The (now infamous) Economist. It
\ndoesn\u2019t take so much to put a few words together; I mean even those with a
\nfair knowledge of any language can do a passable job at giving an
\nexplanation.<\/p>\n
The way I see it, The Economist Explains, a blog hosted by The Economist
\noffers a pot-pourri of poorly investigated articles that do little more
\nthan cast aspersions on individuals and governments in a way that leave
\nreaders wondering where their focus is.<\/p>\n
One of their June 26, 2016 articles attempts to talk about how Nigeria is
\n\u2018fighting corruption\u2019. And how do you suppose The Economist approaches
\nthis important topic? With the same careless banter a sleazy tabloid would
\ntake on a gossip story.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t know if I should be more insulted about the derogatory tone used
\nin the entire piece or by the writer\u2019s assumption that the people who read
\nthe article will actually not see through the writer\u2019s laziness and lack
\nof commitment to carrying out a thorough research on the issues raised.<\/p>\n
I begin to wonder if this is not some image laundry stunt by the present
\ngovernment in a bid to boost their fast dwindling support. I hope that The
\nEconomist understands the implication of crapping all over what could have
\nbeen a very good piece of writing. Their credibility too begins to wan
\ntill the blog goes from \u2018The Economist Explains\u2019 to \u2018The Economist, what?\u2019<\/p>\n
It would be ludicrous of me to deny that Nigeria does have its fair share
\nof challenges, however, like many Nigerians, I will not endorse an article
\nfilled with allegations that have no bases in thorough investigations and
\nis laden with badly reported and misinterpreted facts.<\/p>\n
In this article, the current finance minister is attributed with tenacity;
\nsomething which the writer says has helped her clamp down on spending of
\ngovernors and implement several strategies to save already depleting
\nfunds, such as the widely popular Treasury Savings Account [TSA]. These
\nsound great, heroic even, if only they were accurate. \u2018Her TSA\u2019 is, in
\nfact, the pet project of Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Adeosun\u2019s predecessor.
\nHow a magazine like The Economist could have missed that baffles me. A
\nsimple two-minute google search would have helped this apparently mentally
\nlazy writer get the actual facts and state them as they are.<\/p>\n
However, as with the mentally lazy, the task may appear daunting, so I
\nshall set them straight. And this, I choose to achieve through the citing
\nof an article published by a Nigerian national daily in April 2016 [long
\nbefore Kemi Adeosun dreamt of becoming Minister of Finance].<\/p>\n
Okonjo-Iweala said, \u201cWith the treasury single account, we have a tool that
\nhelps us to see the balances of governments at one time from all
\ngovernment agencies because we are drawing resources into the central
\nbank\u201d.<\/p>\n
And another published as part of a congratulatory message delivered by
\nGoodluck Jonathan when Dr Okonjo-Iweala was appointed GAVI Chair:<\/p>\n
\u201cThrough your vision, the nation was able to implement some rewarding
\nreforms in public financial management including the launch of the
\nTreasury Single Account (TSA) to boost dwindling revenue, as well as the
\nintroduction of the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System
\n(IPPIS), which eliminated thousands of ghost workers from the public
\nservice system\u201d.<\/p>\n
As for the acclaimed tenacity of Mrs Adeosun, many will bear witness that
\nshe is now popularly known for her attempt to drown Nigeria further into
\ndebt than any other finance minister before her, especially since the debt
\nbailout spearheaded by Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.<\/p>\n
A blog that is the offshoot of renowned The Economist should not be found
\nspewing such stories that have no truth. If this is a PR job, as we have
\nseen others do in the past, then, it was poorly executed.<\/p>\n
Ebun is a Public Relations professional. She writes from Ado-Ekiti<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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