By Bawa Abubakar
Nigeria is indeed an interesting place and we are currently living in a very interesting time. I dare to say that we are living in a strange time such that we have never experienced before in our dear country Nigeria. The situation in my side of the country up north is so bizarre it feels like we are in a horror movie. All hell has been let loose in my neck of the wood in the last two years that tears well up my eyes as I write this.
The so-called subsidy removal and exchange rate equalisation announced by the president in his inauguration speech impacted us up here instantaneously. Before the president stepped down from the inauguration podium most petrol stations had closed their gates, virtually chasing out even motorists at the pumps.
When they reopened a few days later, petrol pump price had jumped from about N250.00 to about N550.00. That was in May 2023. By December ending 2023, it was as if Armageddon had come early in the north. Fuel price was over N700 per litre; exchange rate was about N860/$ and hunger and malnutrition raged around us. We saw infants withering and dying before us. It was indeed a shock treatment as described by the British newspaper FT.
We thought President Muhammadu Buhari was very poor at the job considering that Nigeria even suffered an economic recession in 2016. We cried and wailed about hardship in the north. Little did we know we were in paradise all the while.
As an economist and entrepreneur who has been trying to cobble together numerous small scale businesses since the past 10 years, I began to reflect upon what has transpired over the decade. How my potable water production business and grains farm have almost vanished in the last two years and my workers dissipated. The abrupt fuel price hike hit my little factory hard. We shut down temporarily… and we could never open again till today.
I remembered the immediate past governor of the CBN, Mr. Godwin Emefiele. I had worked in a private firm post-graduation from university until I latched on to one of his numerous development finance programmes. I thought the Youth Entrepreneurship Development Programme (YEDP) was a ruse. Which youth trusted the Nigerian government? But my friend who had succeeded convinced me to apply.
I got an initial five million naira for the production of potable water. It was the peak of dry season in Kaduna. It was so successful I was able to pay back in record time. I applied for another loan under another dev finance scheme called: 100 for 100 Policy on Productivity (PPP).
I invested in maize production. It was also a good and profitable investment. I was able to repay the principal before the new sheriffs came to the CBN in 2023. Virtually all those direct intervention development finance programmes have bee thrown out so to speak. Like the new government, the CBN seems to have no human face whatsoever.
This must explain why there’s so much poverty in Nigeria today. In the land of plenty like Nigeria, there should never be so much hunger, starvation and poverty across the country. Not to mention the increased violence and bloodshed across the north.
It was laughable to me when Mr. Emefiele was first picked up on the charge of sponsoring terrorism. Then we heard he was being held for gun running. When all these failed, they accused him of all sorts of things.
It was of course all politically motivated. Never in the history of Nigeria has a CBN governor been so dragged. A man who has been in banking all his life, rising to become the GMD of one of the largest private financial holding companies in Africa was never a pauper.
It becomes laughable when such a person is being accused of pilfering foreign currency through his office boy. They said he bought some property here and there. And the question is: is there any property the head of the largest bank in Nigeria cannot afford? Well, that’s for the courts to decide.
But the point they will not admit is that Nigeria wouldn’t be the hell it is today if Emefiele’s robust macroeconomic policies had subsisted in the CBN till date. The difference between Emefiele and the crew at the bank today is worlds apart. Let me enumerate just a few:
Corruption: I knew CBN a bit having participated in their loan schemes. My friends still working in the bank say no senior management appointments are made on merit or seniority any more. Those who want it badly have to pay heavily for it – and in dollars too. So major appointments are now purchased. Of course fresh jobs are almost 100% offered on ethnic considerations. Merit is in abeyance at the CBN now.
DISCO Metering Programme: Since Emefiele left the CBN, hardly has any electricity distribution company given out meters. In 2020, Emefiele’s CBN introduced the Nigeria Mass Metering Programme (NMMP) which facilitated nearly one million smart electric meters. This was installed for consumers free of any immediate charges. The cost recovery was built into subsequent energy purchases by the consumer.
Most electricity consumers in Nigeria would probably have been metered today if the scheme had been allowed to continue.
Yet, despite the exorbitant rates of meter delivery to consumers, DISCOS still cannot deliver. Even after payment.
Emefiele, Buhari cared about Nigeria and the people: CBN had so many programmes then that people began to wonder whether it was the economic ministry. We all remember that about 44 basic products were barred from official Forex allocation.
Today, we have not only jettisoned that rule, FG officially provides funds in trillions of naira for the importation of grains.
Nigeria was almost becoming self-sufficient in rice production with mills growing exponentially. Today, many rice mills are no longer producing because there is no paddy to mill.
CBN used to have electricity stabilisation facilities. Today the average Nigerian cannot afford electricity. More money for government, more trouble for the people: They accused Emefiele of accumulating ways and means borrowings of over N30 trillion in nine years. But in two years Ways and Means has exceeded 10 trillion already. We don’t even have proper records anymore.
The FG is awash with cash today, having removed subsidy, closed Forex arbitrage, hiked taxes and levies, not to mention stupendous borrowings. Yet the economy is far worse than it was. Nigeria is melting and our people are dying of hunger. Where’s all the money gone? The simple difference is that Emefiele and Buhari were applying Nigeria’s revenues to develop the country and sustain the well being of the people.
Finally, there’s no doubt that Nigerians are missing Emefiele and Buhari’s time already just after two years of the current administration. We must not forget that these two men vehemently refused to devalue our naira in spite of threats from the West. They also resisted removing fuel subsidy in one swoop, knowing it would hurt the Nigerian poor irretrievably as we see happening today. Such was their patriotism and leadership acumen. We miss them already!
• Abubakar, an economist/entrepreneur, writes from Kaduna