The Nigerian President Responds To Social Protests Tagged #EndBadGovernance

Nigeria is in the throes of national social protests at the moment with at least a dozen people killed so far, this is besides the destruction and looting. The 10-day protests billed to take place between 1^st August 2024 to 10^th August, 2024 came with much fanfare and gusto from those organising them. And the authorities have been threatening fire and brimstone in a bid to discourage these protests. Unfortunately for them, there is so much hunger, poverty, misgovernance, high inflation and unbearable distress for the masses to be intimidated by threats.

Realising the futility of their efforts; even after co-opting all stakeholders  including organised labour, organised private sector, all religious and traditional institutions, unions and organisations to its side; the authorities secured ex parte court orders to limit the protests to designated locations in the capital; Abuja; as well as the commercial hub; Lagos.

The causes of these protests include principally economic insecurity. Nigeria uses virtually all its revenue on its loans than on the people. It spends more of its income on its loans than on all other things put together. The ideal ratio for debt service is 22.5% as set by the World Bank and the IMF for economies like Nigeria’s. However, in the first half of 20223, Nigeria used 97% of revenue to service debts! Even now that the numbers for debt-service have improved to 68% of revenue in 2024Q2, something has been sacrificed on the altar of the lower debt-service numbers. This is so as Nigeria’s debt burden to GDP ratio has crossed the self-imposed limit of 40%.

Furthermore, Nigeria is experiencing the worst cost of living crisis in a generation. Headline inflation is at 34.19% according to official government statistics. Other authorities have far higher figures several times the official numbers. What is more, food inflation is far worse than the headline. Nigerians are experiencing hunger at the moment because Nigerians neither afford food nor is the food even available. Other pressing problems include high fuel prices and a general exorbitant cost of living pricing out almost everyone out of a decent life.

And copious solutions have been provided in the spirit of not only critiquing but providing alternatives to what is being critiqued. Of course, these are neither exhaustive nor conclusive. While their is an overwhelming proof that the president of Nigeria who only came in around 15 months ago in May, 2023 might have inherited a very bad economy, he has not made things any better but quite the contrary made things far worse with ill-thought out subsidy removal, floating of the naira and a myriad other missteps.

The expectation of many Nigerians when the President decided to address the nation because of the protest, was that  concrete measures with SMART characteristics would be introduced to roll back the damage caused by the President’s own policies. However, the president’s speech only regurgitated the efforts to provide succour, that have completely fallen flat on their face and have been nothing beyond cosmetics. Their is an urgent need to  have solutions that would move the needle. There is a need for the President to not only address the nation but to demonstrate clear-cut deliverables about the issues at hand such.

Like in Kenya where the president withdrew the finance law, abolished dozens of government departments, fired his cabinet, cut fiscal allocations for the presidency and the general costs of governance. Nigeria needs to not only take a leaf out of the Kenyan book but even go further to overhaul the entire apparatus of governance and government generally. This would be a gesture showing the authorities’ determination to fix the problems that made the population to take to the street.

The Nigerian leader, President Bola A. Tinubu needs to go beyond speaking. Addressing these problems would be what really matters. There is a need to make food affordable to all Nigerians, particularly the low-income earners who have been priced out of purchasing essentials like rice and flour. Nigeria being the nation with the least affordable food for its citizens according to the food security index. In terms of availability too, Nigeria is lagging. It is languishing at the bottom of the availability metric.

The authorities’ closing the borders to boost agriculture under the last president was a huge mistake. As Nigeria has not attained food sufficiency nor has it demonstrated the capacity for such in the nearest future. For example, while the total consumption of rice is in the region of 7 million metric tonnes, the production is way below that at 4 million metric tonnes. So, why shut down borders? It would benefit no one but the rice farmers at the detriment of everyone else.

Because food is not affordable and is not available; this is why the determination of the government to allow for food import should not be looked at with suspicion. The President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Akinwunmi Adesina, has come out all guns blazing against the importation claiming that it would reverse the gains made in the agricultural space so far. Of course, no one wants these gains to be rolled back. But, there is a deficit for years now fueling rising prices. Hence there is nothing wrong about plugging the shortfall. So, the tariff-free food importation is necessary as a stop-gap measure to feed millions of hungry Nigerian while we try to increase the productivity or efficiency of our agriculture.

These are some of the problems as well as the solutions I am proposing that can be immediately implemented to solve some the most pressing challenges Nigerians face:

1. There is a need for food to be affordable to everyday Nigerians inclusive of the lowest income earners.
2. Food being available to everyone.
3. Cost of living coming down to the barest minimum.
4. etc

We are not just raising concerns and proposing general and ineffective solutions but also providing what we think are solutions.

1. Problem- Subsidy removal has made price of fuel spiked with the knock-on effects on the cost of living. What can be done to lower this price?                     

Solutions-

• Encouraging local refining; whether by Dangote refinery, government refineries and modular refineries; with a surfeit of crude feedstock so as not to subject Nigeria’s domestic fuel price to the vicissitudes of international oil price.
• Immediate implementation of the much-hyped Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) wholesomely with the listing of the NNPC to ensure full transparency of the Nigerian oil industry to guarantee value for money.
• Aggressively incentivise local & foreign investments into the oil and gas industry to boost production and revenue.
• Bringing the full force of the Nigerian state to bear in tackling oil theft and insecurity in the oil producing areas as well as everywhere else.

This is but a few of the immediate things that can be done that would move the needle in bringing down fuel price.

 2. Problem- Food is neither affordable nor available for Nigerians.   

Solutions-

• Only the Nigerian state has a monopoly on the use of violence to achieve results. Hence, it should deploy its full powers of coercion to end banditry, militancy, insurgency, the herder issue, criminality, kidnappings and any form of insecurity within months so that all Nigerians, most especially farmers are safe on their farms. That way everyone would go back to their farming activities.
• Increase tractorisation and mechanisation. The government should not try to do this by itself as it has limited capacity. But rather, incentivise Nigerians and non-Nigerians to change from using hoe & cutlass and other stone-age tools to instead doing modern farming with sophisticated tools.  We need machines in the millions to boost horse power per hectare and to increase yield.
• Refineries would help with fertiliser. There is a need to subsidise fertiliser and other farm inputs to boost production.
• Encourage all year round farming by fixing dilapidated dams. While trillions of naira of foreign loans might have been secured for this, there is a need to be intentional about results and results only.
• We must never repeat the mistake of the anchor borrowers programme (ABP) by just throwing money at problems believing these problems would magically solve themselves. There is a need for intentionality, clear timelines and KPIs and guarantee value for every kobo spent.
• Post harvest losses which could be as high as 80% must be reduced to almost zero with modern storage, improved infrastructure and better transportation between farms\villages and the markets/cities.
• Do not ask people to pray in the event of lack of rainfall. Instead of that use technology such as cloud seeding to make rain to fall.
• We must focus on our competitive advantage instead of inefficiently trying to produce everything. We can proudly import what we do not have capacity for now while building that capacity. For example rice.

These are only a few solutions that can be implemented with the urgency of now.

3. Problem- Cost of living crisis. Some even go as far as selling their own babies to feed and pay rent! It is that bad.

Solutions-

• To demonstrate empathy the political class inclusive of the president must demonstrate beyond the shadow of a doubt that they too are enduring same hardships that Nigerians are suffering. This would build confidence, understanding from the people and followership.       As leadership is about being exemplary and doing same thing you want others to do. So, stop losing the plot by enduring same things you ask your citizens to endure.
• Cut the cost of governance by 90% or by much as possible by making do with just the barest. Oransaye report is outdated, so update it within a week and implement it within weeks. The savings from this should be used to support the most vulnerable Nigerians in a clear and transparent way.
• The CBN has not done enough to keep a lid on money supply as it has reached all an all-time high of over 101 trillion naira now. Because inflation is always and everywhere monetary in nature. So, stop the growth in money supply and not currency in circulation (CIC) as the CBN likes to demonise CIC in an way that doesn’t make sense.
• Ways and Means Advances must be scrapped completely and urgently too and never be increased as was recently done. How many people; including yours sincerely; would not feel the temptation to just print money if it is within their powers to do so whenever the urgent need for money arises? So stop it entirely as it is always subject to abuse and has caused more problems and proven our undoing eventually.
• No one should strip the CBN of its operational independence as the Senate tried to do. It is unwise, shortsighted and dangerous. In fact, to the contrary what the CBN needs now is more independence from politicians not less.
• Do everything to boost exports particularly from Nano, Small, Medium-Scaled Enterprises (NSMSMEs) as they have been punching below their weight. Diversifying Nigeria’s exports from oil and gas needs to be done urgently. If we cannot export goods immediately then lets export services to grow the naira and make it the strong currency Nigerians like it to be.

These are only few immediate solutions out of dozens that I have.

In conclusion, Nigeria might be on its knees at the moment which basically self-inflicted through gross incompetence and bad governance, consequently, there is a need to be drastic in urgent in measures to stop the descend in its tracks. As Nigeria is a country of  a huge population and treating things with levity or at snail-pace would not cut it.