A year after, time for governance

Yours comradely felicitates with all Nigerians on the occasion of 2016 Democracy Day which marks the 1 year anniversary of President Muhammadu Buhari Administration. One year after President Muhammad Buhari administration was inaugurated, undoubtedly Nigeria now has a government in place. However a year after government has been formed it’s time for good governance. Some […]

Yours comradely felicitates with all Nigerians on the occasion of 2016 Democracy Day which marks the 1 year anniversary of President Muhammadu Buhari Administration. One year after President Muhammad Buhari administration was inaugurated, undoubtedly Nigeria now has a government in place. However a year after government has been formed it’s time for good governance. Some of the measures announced by President Muhammadu Buhari in his anniversary speech are certainly commendable and welcome. I agree with President Muhammadu Buhari that “a strong currency is predicated on a strong economy. And a strong economy pre-supposes an industrial productive base…” Industrialization therefore remains the key to economic recovery for Nigeria. The advantages of industrialization include lessening of dependency on imports, thus saving scarce foreign exchange. It also serves as a source of employment for greater number of the non-working unemployed population.
Industrialization invariably reduces income poverty. The federal government must therefore accord urgent attention to the revival of labour intensive industries such as textile and garment. The industry can employ 3 million direct jobs. 26 out of the 36 states grow cotton of both long and short stable lengths. Sadly, Nigeria has become a dumping ground for mostly smuggled fabrics and even second-hand banned unhealthy cloths.
The administration of President Buhari must overcome infrastructural inadequacy, electricity supply, smuggling, low patronage, counterfeiting and faking, raw materials among others if Nigeria will re-Industrialize. The infrastructural challenges call for strong government interventions. President Buhari must convene stakeholders meeting on textile with a view of implementing the Nigeria industrial Revolution Plan (NIRP) and the National Cotton, Textile and Garment policy. I am on the same page with President Buhari that the solution to the problems in the downstream sector is not importation of petrol but building domestic local refinery.  It is a correct observation on the part of the President that a major producer of crude oil with four refineries that once exported refined products today has to import all of its domestic needs. Nigeria can only save on foreign exchange and strengthen the Naira if it fast tracks repair of the refineries and produce most of our fuel requirements at home.  Nigeria must take advantage of the multiple benefits of crude oil by fixing existing local refineries, exploring local refining capacity and building petrochemical and gas plants and in the process create sustainable mass decent jobs.
I also commend President Muhammadu Buhari on the successful launching of N500 billion as direct social transfers or conditional cash transfer program for the poorest and most vulnerable.  The N500 billion conditional cash transfer is appropriated in the 2016 budget for social intervention programmes in five key areas that include; providing job creation opportunities for five hundred thousand teachers and one hundred thousand artisans across the nation. The socially sensitive policy that would feed 5.5 million children with nutritious meals through school feeding programme to improve learning outcomes, as well as enrolment and completion rates is timely. The cash transfers to the vulnerable not only assist the vulnerable but help in national economic growth. CBN once spent as much as over N3trillion to bail out just 8 corporate banks under the Asset Management Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) established on the 19th July 2010, by President Yar Adua. If Nigeria could appropriate such huge resources, (almost half of this year’s budget!) to efficiently resolve the problem of the non-performing loan assets of the banks, we commend President Buhari for coming to the plight of as many as absolutely 70 million poor Nigerians who are living on less than a dollar per day by making them to access national resources as a matter of right. The conditional legitimate transfers should serve as the basis for a National comprehensive Social security for Nigeria.  Sustainable implementation of this policy should be through critical labour market institutions like the Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund (NSITF).
The recent spate of attacks on oil and power installations by some militants in the Niger Delta must be legitimate sources of worry to all compatriots.  All Nigerians and indeed all Africans are worse off with serial economic sabotage.  Indeed assaults on oil and gas assets push Nigeria into deeper underdevelopment. President Buhari must accelerate the implementation of the United Nations environment programme report on Niger Delta as promised in his anniversary speech.
Yesterday was observed as a democracy day. As I have argued before I do not know of any democratic country other than a democratic Nigeria that proudly sits at home annually to reflect on the virtue of liberty and freedom that are the hall marks of democratic process. Democracy unleashes the abundant creative energy bottled up by dictatorship and creates an atmosphere for unfettered productive activities and development. In a backward country like Nigeria with growth rate miserably lagging behind population growth rate, with as many as 70 per cent below poverty-level, the importance of work and productivity cannot be over-emphasized. Why again declaring today a public holiday? Buhari administration should reverse this inherited culture of non-working democracy which announces frivolous public holidays in a nation begging for improved productivity.