By Rahaman Owokoniran
PDP South West Zonal Secretary
The chat was basically more of an address to the nation. It was a calculated attempt to orchestrate his political agenda to get the people to believe in his policies. According to him, he had no intention whatsoever to do anything about the concerns of the people in respect of his policies that had been consequential to the people of this nation. He couldn’t be bordered about the economic situation as it affects the lives of millions of the citizens. Rather he is strong on his insistence that his policies are the only path way to achieve the economic recovery.
Unfortunately, Mr President could only convince himself about his policies. He started by blaming the organizers of the palliative event that led to unfortunate deaths in the different parts of the country for lack of organization. How are those different from the President’s actions in his preparation for the introduction of his policies? The events planners caused loss of so many lives and so do Mr President. The events planners are being held responsible for their negligence but the burden of guilt rest squarely on the government that has no regulations to prevent such occurrences. Even in war time, a retreat is allowed after the loss of control over the battlefield. One cannot but wonder when it will be time to make necessary decisions to prevent further casualties from these policies. As fervent and determined as the president is ready to stand his ground, he said nothing persuasive to convince Nigerians other than shifting the blame on the consumers. He said that the consumers were paying less rate for their electricity consumption than they should. Was he not reflecting on the effect of the subsidy removal and the impact of the Naira Devaluation? The spontaneous increase in the prices of petrol and devaluation of the Naira impacted negatively on consumers in every aspect of their lives. What an excuse by the government to justify low tariffs on electricity as reason for increasing the prices on electricity bills by over 300% at the same time Naira is being devalued by 500%. By the way, he alluded to the fact that he has been transparent but he has not explain why the government and its parastatals have been operating on free electricity consumption. What is this administration doing about holding government accountable for electricity bills and other free bills in the meantime and the nearest future. The president said that the fuel price hike is beginning to come down. Isn’t this celebration coming too soon ? Considering the fact that the drop in price is way less than .08 percent of the value of the initial price increase of this administration. With the dollar stagnation what could have been responsible for this decline in the price of fuel in a free market economy? Nigeria government has been living large and thriving in a world of lies and deception for decades. Mr President, you need to be persuasive about your state of the nation speech. The idea that you promised to fix it and we should wait until you fix it is a misplaced assumption. The people need to know what they are paying for.
The President talked about the following in his interview.
1) Subsidy removal ; it was the president’s opinion that Nigeria cannot afford to continue to pay for its neighbors fuel bills. Therefore, he said that he had no regrets for his decision to remove the fuel subsidy. He expressed the desire to tackle corruption,poverty and improving the economy through this reform. But his confidence is based upon free market policies which he continues to promote since his resumption in office 20 months ago. Free market was a result of global economic policy which is based upon an international marketing model that is designed to promote global economic development. This model has not been adopted by many countries because they cannot afford to be competitive in the market. What do we stand to gain from this model as a consuming nation. Why can’t we grow at our own pace instead of wallowing in debt to keep up the Western world model ? China , India, North Korea , Japan and other nations have already done this without the help from the IMF and World Bank. If we are seeking help from any where, it should be one to get us out of the hole and not the one to keep us perpetually suffering in the dark ages.
2) Naira Devaluation; according to the president, Nigerians had been living above their means for decades and unless he is allowed to devalue the currency to encourage investment into the country now, it will be too late to stop the bleeding. Even though the president expressed optimism about this policy position, he left out how it will work for us when our production capacity is nothing to write home about. We can hardly feed ourselves let alone exporting to other nations for revenue generation. What purpose does our hurried Naira devaluation serve if we don’t have relative advantage in the market to grow our economy. It is my view that this government should reconsider its approach and implement a policy that will put the people to work and create the enabling environment for entrepreneurs, small and medium scale industries to develop through their creative and innovative enterprises. This will lead us to a development model that will enable us to achieve our goals in the long run.
3) Energy Price Hike; :The President’s proposal for the growth of the nation’s economy is to increase energy and supply by the use of renewable energy sources through technologies to offset rising energy costs. This policy is based on an assumption that energy efficiency will cut costs for consumers and reduce energy consumption by businesses and enhance energy efficiency. It is expected to increase economic growth by reducing energy prices to meet the national demand for energy production and services. But what about the debt burden transferred to the consumers by government who happened to have been the biggest debtor to the energy suppliers. Again, the president said that this policy is another way to cub government excesses and control corruption. It is amazing that in spite of the hick up of the energy prices, we still continue to have electricity shortages due to the lack of energy supplies. Businesses are struggling to cope with these shortages and prices hick to the point where we cannot afford the high cost of electricity, food, fuel and other commodities. When is our president’s energy deliveries coming to fruition? The president could have spoken about the status of our energy supplies. But he assured the public that he had a magic one to deliver on his promises. Mr President, we will sleep well knowing where you are going with your energy policy instead of your political rhetorics.
4th) Economic expansion; Acceleration of economic growth according to the President is to Invest in technology, weaponry, trade , agriculture. energy, infrastructure and etc. And we understand the above is yet to be unveil by the government. The same government that promised to put our refineries in operation and told us that the refineries were ready to go into operation and it hasn’t happen until now. The same administration that said our economic recovery will be achieved in two years and nothing to show for that promise.to date. This same administration is now undertaking to solve our problems concerning energy shortages, agriculture, high cost of food and fuel prices , inflation, infrastructure deficit and high cost of living etc.
Why can’t Mr President deal with this problems one at a time? You are 18 months into this administration and by this time next year you will be about 3years in office. You may want to reconsider your position on the above issue as well as others because considering the global economic situation your timing may be wrong for this type of economic adventure.
5th) Tax Reform; It is good that Mr President admitted to the fact that his tax reform is about expanding the tax net to raise more money for government. This is not a bad idea but the idea of raising taxes when the economy is depressed is ludicrous. Right now the economy is depressed and therefore unsustainable for tax increase. This is the time for government to provide the enabling assistance needed by businesses and individuals to sustain themselves while maintaining a stable economy. But this government would rather increase its economic growth by raising taxes and spending to pay for its economic expansion at the expense of its citizens which will amount to nothing but economic stagnation and unemployment. Mr president should reconsider his decision on the tax increase and the cost of living crisis in this economy and make necessary adjustments. There is no better way to reduce the population than the impact of this policies on the lives of the people of this nation.
6th) Expansion of the size of government . Again the president was emphatic that he had no intention to reduce the size of his cabinet . He said his staff were carefully selected and they met the requirements for their jobs descriptions. He added that he had implicit knowledge of their capabilities and that he can vouch for them. Without missing words , the President expressed confidence in his decisions on his policies including the expanded government size which had been criticized by many as unnecessary in order to reduce the cost of governance. What other reasons are there for the President’s decision to retain the cabinet capacity in question? If the country was to be his personal enterprise and the business is going through this difficult period of decline and depression, would he prioritize expanding the management staff over a reasonable wage structure?
I doubt it very much.
Finally, Mr President, it takes a responsible leader to admit that the system is faulty and make amends instead of struggling against adversity and failure.