Category: Editorial

•An industrialist’s kick against incentives for exporting agricultural raw materials makes economic sense

Dimeji Owofemi, chief executive officer of Multi-Trex Integrated Foods Plc, has kicked against incentives for the export of agricultural raw materials. To foster local industrialisation — in which Mr. Owofemi is a key player — that makes economic common sense.

Speaking with the Punch newspaper, Mr. Owofemi decried the blanket incentive given non-oil exports, among which is 20 per cent subsidy, under the Export Expansion Grant (EEG), though now suspended. That he rightly argued, ab initio, makes the “exporter” enjoy a 20 per cent lower cost profile. Should he now engage in trade round-tripping (export the raw materials to specific foreign factory to add value), the processed good comes back at a premium.

So, Nigeria buys back at a premium, what it virtually auctioned off on the cheap! The result? Financially, a net-loss — and of course, local de-industrialisation: more blues for local manufacturers; and less jobs for the Nigerian worker. Now, how can a country make a policy that does nothing but eventually beggars it?

In fairness, non-oil raw materials are not restricted to agricultural produce alone.  They could also cover solid minerals mining and allied products. But in its implementation, agricultural raw materials dominate that segment of exports — perhaps because agriculture is the easier to process than mining? That grim reality hits local players hard — and further chronically cut job opportunities.

Hear Mr. Owofemi’s lament: “As a local manufacturer, I turn raw materials into finished products. I use 100,000 litres of diesel to power my generator every month and I pay staff salaries. The exporter does not need a retinue of staff or warehouse. Even though we enjoy 30 per cent subsidy on raw materials, the percentage has already been swallowed up by the cost of manufacturing in this environment.”

The grim result? Some 212 of Multi-Trex Integrated Foods Plc staff, according to the report, are out on “compulsory leave without pay” owing to the adverse business atmosphere.  Multi-Trex is only one of hundreds, if not thousands, of struggling local industries which government policy continues to throttle. That must stop.

In fairness, however, this woe is only the segmented face of a harsh, misguided overall economic policy — of selling cheap your prime asset but buying the value-added “import” back at a premium, with devastating economic consequences.

It is the same misguided philosophy that inspired the so-called liberalisation by fuel importation. That was the Olusegun Obasanjo administration’s grand answer to the grand larceny in Nigeria’s petroleum downstream: since you cannot nail thieves embezzling money to fix local refineries, then export crude raw, outsource refining but import back the refined product. Does it not make more common sense to do local refining?

Years after that grant “wisdom”, the fierce argument continues on “fuel subsidy”!  Meanwhile, the economy gets overheated, bordering on total collapse — if the “economy” is defined as a deepened local industrial base.

Yet, that basic thinking is nothing new. Even before Nigeria got flag independence from Britain, adding value to agricultural raw materials was at the root of Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s industrial policy. That fired much of the Ojota, Ikeja, Ilupeju and other industrial estates in coastal Lagos, fed by raw produce like rubber, cocoa and the like.

How such economic common sense became heresy over the years is just befuddling!  And it is certainly an irony of monumental proportion that Segun Awolowo, Awo’s grandson, is mixed up in the present policy morass, as the chief executive officer of the Nigeria Export Promotion Council (NEPC)!

On face value, even the most attractive of public policies need rigorous interrogation. It could indeed appear a short-term clinch but a long-term trap. Any policy not well thought-out, therefore, almost always comes back to haunt the polity and economy.

That is why Mr. Owofemi is right: the government must re-think incentives to export agricultural raw materials — before it completely denudes the local economy. Such should be processed and consumed locally; and, if there is excess, export after adding value.

Budget passed in the fourth month of the year with a paltry provision for fuel subsidy …

ALTHOUGH  the out-going administration of President Goodluck Jonathan may continue to be in denial, the economy is in dire straits. First, the 2015 federal budget which was passed by the National Assembly last week is coming in ludicrously late – four months in the year. Yes, the budget never came on time all through the life of this administration, but exceptional latitude seems to have mired the process this year.

Never being able to get the budget ready on time in six years is indeed symptomatic of the economic and fiscal management of the polity in this era. No studied attempt was made by the overly large economic team of President Jonathan to take the economy nary one step further than it was pre-2011. While oil prices were at their best ever in the international market, Nigeria’s economy was roiling – tumbling and stumbling until the current crunch which started late last year.

There is indeed crisis and it is uncanny that the Jonathan administration would want to leave the economy in a gale of crises. The budget has been passed with the provision of a paltry N100bn for fuel subsidy. This automatically means that government has unilaterally reduced the so-called subsidy drastically, given that about N500bn was said to have been spent on it this year alone. The subsidy is supposed to be a  safety net for cushioning the possible adverse effects that may be occasioned by hikes in pump prices of petrol and kerosene. This is a highly volatile issue that is capable of sparking sustained dissension in the polity. The labour unions have already warned that it would not accept any jumps in petrol prices.

Another signpost of an imminent economic upheaval is the scarcity of fuel which has started to manifest across the country. Oil marketers who are the importers of petroleum products claim the Federal Government owes them arrears in excess of N356.2 billion and some of the debt dates back to last year. They insist they can no longer import, store or transport products. They also cannot raise fresh loans while interests on old facilities are crippling.

Minister of Finance, Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, was a sorry sight as she explained that N156 billion was available to pay the marketers last week. She admitted that “despite revenue challenges facing the government”, the issue of fuel subsidy payments had always been a priority of government. She appealed to the marketers: “They are also Nigerians and they need to also cooperate with us.”

Since passionate appeals will not offset bank loans or make trucks move, it is apparent that scarcity and its attendant social anxieties will remain with us for quite some time. This fact will be more germane in this last month of administrative transition. Unless this government sources at least N300 billion in the next few days, the country could be in for a blistering energy crisis.

The chicken has come home to roost, so to speak, for the Jonathan administration, for failing to take smart economic measures all through its time. After the January 2012 fuel subsidy protests occasioned by a sudden hike in price, government had promised to build four green field refineries. Completion of these refineries would have ensured the stoppage of importation of products and saved huge foreign exchange, especially in these lean times of oil price crash. Not even one was built despite the huge oil earnings in these past few years.

Nigeria is the only major oil producer that still imports refined products, sometimes from non-oil producing countries.

We urge that the sitting government should promptly raise funds and pay the marketers to avert the looming crisis. The incoming government has its work cut out for it. It must review the entire gamut of the oil sector in order to revamp and clean the subsisting mess therein.

Of course, building of modern refineries must be a priority of the Buhari administration as the current importation scheme is not sustainable. Refining a good percentage of crude could also be a precondition for major oil corporations in Nigeria. They run huge refineries elsewhere; they should be mandated to do same here as government pursues a medium term policy of zero crude export.

It will be a shame for the Jonathan administration to end in a crisis.

We welcome CBN’s decision to name and shame

COULD it be that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has suddenly realised the destructive influence of chronic bank debtors on the economy? The apex bank, in a letter titled “Recovery of Delinquent Credit Facilities,” and signed by Tokunbo Martins, its director, banking supervision, on April 22, told the banks and discount houses that from May 1, 2015, delinquent debtors, whether individual or corporate accounts, must be given three months ultimatum to turn their accounts from non-performing to performing status. Those who fail to do so will have their names published, by the end of July, in not less than three national newspapers.

Apart from this, they would also be banned, alongside their members of the board of directors, as well as their subsidiary firms, from participating in the Nigerian foreign exchange market, and also from participating in the Nigerian government securities market.

According to Martins, “…it is increasingly becoming difficult for some debtors to pay up their loans. So it was decided that going forward, one thing that we may do is to stop them from getting access to foreign exchange. This is to ensure the continuous safety and soundness of the banking industry…It is not all debtors, it is the bad and chronic debtors, those ones that have deliberately refused to pay; those are the ones we are talking about. Total loans in the industry are in the region of N13 to N15 trillion.”

The move to curb the increasing NPLs is a welcome development. This is much more so that the intervention of the widely celebrated Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON), on toxic assets from the banks’ books in the past has not really yielded the desired result. The point must be made though that not every person that took loans from banks did so with the intention of repaying, especially in our kind of country where things are upside down and laws are hardly enforced.

We call on the Bankers’ Committee to be more effective in this regard. It will be sad if this trend is allowed to bring back the era of liquidity problems in the banking sector. Basically, the menace of NPLs is purely a manifestation of regulation failure as most banks’ officials either circumvent laid-down regulations or deliberately ignore the basics while considering and approving loan requests.

Indeed, some top officials of banks have gone away with this without any serious sanction, thereby serving as impetus for others to also go in that direction. This was not the way it was done in the past as officials ensured that collateral security taken from people wishing to take loans from the banks was such that would make it unattractive for them not to want to repay the loans.

The government too has a fundamental role to play because instability of government policies has also impeded the performance of several loans. This is a consequence of consistent change in policy to satisfy the whims of a few without thinking of the implications of such decisions on the larger economy. This is further aggravated by incompetence of several investors that have taken bank loans to finance investment take-over without due diligence. The grandiose unsustainable lifestyle of some of the people that took loans has worsened the chances of redeeming such facility within the stipulated time frame.

The apex bank must therefore come up with a practical solution to the challenges of foreign exchange rate that have been worsening by the day, thus rendering the calculations of what debtors are expected to repay due to fluctuations in the exchange rate meaningless. The problem becomes the more compounded when added to the ever rising interest rate.

The nation should try as much as possible to avoid another bank crisis that the increasing rate of bad loans might precipitate. All loans must be repaid and the onerous task of achieving this is on the CBN.

SIR: Having lived and worked in the city of Lagos for many years and for the better part of my youthful years, I am always nostalgic about Lagos and hence issues pertaining  to it. I was enthralled as a young man by its hustle and bustle along with its variety of lively social life. It is a place without inhibitions compared to other cities  and with so much freedom that easily makes one forget one‘s hometown. This must be a credit to the accommodating nature of the indigenes.

No doubt outsiders along with the indigenes made profound contributions in making Lagos what it is now. Its development has been impacted upon by the colonialists who chose it as a capital and made immense investments in infrastructure that made it a befitting capital. Its natural endowment as seaport with a huge interior market also made it the destination for international capital;  and hence its emergence as West Africa‘s pre-eminent industrial hub. Its subsequent metamorphosis into a megacity came naturally as people within and outside continue to flock into it in droves seeking fortunes. Among the non-natives who are so visible in Lagos are the Igbos and they are probably more in numbers in Lagos than any other place outside  the east. This no doubt has led to demographic shifts in places like Ajegunle, Isolo and Ojo.

However, if truth must be told, Lagos remains Yoruba both in origin and present composition. As for the recent ‘jibe‘ on the Igbos attributed to his eminence, the Oba of Lagos, it is unfortunate that most people readily pounced on the Oba without giving even a scant rebuke to the often boorish behaviour of the guests towards the hosts.

No history of Lagos can jettison the roles of such Obas as Kosoko, Dosunmo or Akitoye.The whiteman‘s impact as colonialists during which they lifted up the city can not be easily forgotten. No ethnic group can pride itself as the prime factor in making Lagos progress. What is more; the Ibrus, Dangotes and many of their likes who are non-Igbo have made visible contributions to Lagos and yet have not beaten their chests to the high heavens over their contributions.

Coming to the crux of the matter, it is important to give Ceaser what is Ceaser‘s. While all Nigerians have a stake in Lagos as necessitated by history, that does not eclipse the fact that it has it‘s aborigines. For those of us from up north travelling down to the city, the ubiquity of a particular ethnic group with it‘s distinct culture is easily noticeable particularly as one moves down from Ilorin in Kwara State. If contiguity and propinquity counts, then Lagos has it‘s indigenes and they need acknowledgement by all settlers and visitors alike. While we all have the right to choose where live in one Nigeria, we all must not forget our own corner of the country or succinctly put – our roots.

• Usman Bulama

     Mairi Village, Maiduguri

•MTN’s surprise gesture at University of Ibadan merits emulation

More than a publicity stunt, the surprise donation of a car to a university teacher, Prof Anthony Durojaiye Ologhobo of the University of Ibadan (UI), by telecom MTN Nigeria qualifies as a celebration of professionalism. It is instructive to note that Ologhobo of UI’s Animal Science Department was considered a positive influence by students who nominated him for a surprise reward in MTN’s Surprise Your Professor campaign.

It was understandably a surprise for Ologhobo who had no idea such an award was coming. He was quoted as saying concerning his new KIA car: “This is a gift from the Almighty God. I was not expecting anything from MTN. I was only told to come and present some gifts to my students. I don’t know how to explain this. This is a great surprise and I am eternally grateful to MTN for this gesture.”

Evidently, a major aspect of the beauty of this recognition is that students constituted the deciding factor. In a significant sense, the central involvement of students in the selection process gave the endorsement a ring of objectivity and credibility.

In addition, it is remarkable that Ologhobo was reportedly rewarded for his “diligence, moral rectitude and fatherly role.” Against the background of scandalous reports of sex-for-marks and money-for-marks epidemic in universities across the country, among other alleged unsavoury goings-on on campuses, Ologhobo’s story is truly a breath of fresh air. He noted the moral of the narrative: “This is an encouragement for all of us at the University of Ibadan to put our best into whatever we are doing.”

It must be said that the MTN gesture is a commendable example and a reflection of positive thinking.  It is striking that the company’s general manager, consumer marketing, Richard Iweanoge, who gave an insight into the campaign rationale, said:  ”A Professor, within an educational structure, represents an icon; they touch people’s lives in meaningful ways. Ironically, their students become influential people in the society after graduation and forget their teachers who moulded them. In an attempt to change this trend, we beckoned on students all over the country to nominate professors for pleasant surprises.” It is true that, in the modern world, an educationally disadvantaged country cannot hope to make much progress. What is education without teachers?  This question underlines the distinct appeal of the MTN campaign.

It is noteworthy that MTN two months ago gave a new KIA car to a former Dean of Student Affairs, University of Lagos, Professor Harrison Oloruntade Longe, who was rewarded for his “consistency in the discharge of his duties, diligence and professionalism.” Longe was said to have been distinguished by his work in helping to resolve students’ welfare issues.

However, without discounting the potential of such car gifts to inspire and motivate academics, it is necessary to examine the happening more holistically. What about considering the big picture of bigger projects that would have a bigger impact on a greater number of people in the university system? For instance, many universities would benefit from infrastructural development, and companies can think of making contributions in this important area. Ologhobo’s comments can be interpreted as a pointer in this direction. He said: “I equally use this opportunity to call on other corporate bodies to promote academic excellence, and reward the moral rectitude of deserving dons.”

In other words, beyond publicity opportunity and public relations value, giant companies like MTN and even not-so-big ones ought to give back to the society from which they make their gains, and one of the most socially transforming ways of doing this is by promoting education.

• Running a lean state goes beyond scrapping the office of minister of state

The outcome of the last general elections in which the All Progressives Congress (APC) emerged emphatically as Nigeria’s new dominant party at the national and state levels indicates that majority of the electorate voted for the party’s pledge to bring about positive change in the country. In practical terms, this implies that the APC will be held to account as regards its promise to ensure that democracy becomes a vehicle for promoting rapid development and improving the quality of life of the citizenry through good, efficient and responsible governance.

It is obviously in pursuit of this objective that the President-elect, General Muhammadu Buhari, has reportedly submitted to his party’s National Working Committee a proposal to cut the current prohibitive cost of governance by, among other measures, abolishing the office of Minister of State in the Federal Executive Council (FEC). There is no doubt that the unwieldy size of government at all levels has bred massive corruption, wastage, bureaucratic lethargy and inefficiency, thus undermining good and purposeful governance.

Moreover, public office has become an avenue not to offer selfless service to the people but to minister to the greed and vanity of elected and appointed occupants of public office. Against this background, Buhari and the APC will demonstrate that they are genuinely committed to the change agenda if a decisive break is made with the past and the incoming FEC is lean, efficient and its members chosen with strict regard to merit and integrity. This must apply not only at the federal level but also to the states and local government councils.

In this regard, the proposal to streamline the number of ministers by abolishing the duplication and unproductive fractionalisation of ministerial responsibilities through the superfluous office of Minister of State is a sound one. For the most part, the office of junior minister is simply a device to provide patronage to political loyalists rather than enhance the public good.  A good case in point is the external affairs ministry, which inexplicably has three ministers. This has not in any way resulted in a dynamic and vibrant foreign policy for the country. Indeed, the co-existence of two ministers in a ministry creates room for unhealthy rivalry and distracting politicking.

However, drastically cutting the cost of governance must go beyond preoccupation with the office of Minister of State. There is the urgent need, for instance, to overhaul and streamline the number of existing ministries, departments and agencies to eliminate duplication of responsibilities and enhance the overall productivity of governance. Equally obstructive of good governance is the unwieldy number of special advisers, senior special assistants and special assistants appointed by chief executives at all levels of governance.

President Goodluck Jonathan, for instance, appointed 18 special advisers responsible, among others, for energy, research and strategy, legal matters, technical matters, political matters, National Assembly matters, gender issues, social development, ethics and values, New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) as well as international relations, to name a few. Most of these functions fall within the jurisdiction of existing ministries and it is difficult to ascertain what value the special advisers will be adding in these spheres.

We are aware of the need to balance the desire for efficiency and effectiveness in governance with the constitutional requirement that the structures of government at all levels should reflect federal character. If the latter goal is pursued at the expense of the former, however, good governance will be jeopardised and democracy in the country ultimately endangered. Also important is the need to decisively address the current obscene level of remuneration of public office holders in the country, which constitutes a huge burden on the economy and is clearly unsustainable in the long run.

SIR: When Professor Chinedu Ositadinma Nebo was appointed as Minister of Power, he promised to dislodge all the demons and witches in the power sector. He boasted that,’ uninterrupted power supply is not a mirage.’  He reminded us that South Africa was generating 40,000 megawatts for her 40 million population while Nigeria was still battling with the generation of 4,000 megawatts for her 170 million population. Also, while answering questions on the floor of the Senate during his ministerial screening, he cited his unparalleled achievements in the University Of Nigeria, Nsukka where he was vice chancellor.

Regrettably, barely one month to the expiration of this administration, I am compelled to humbly ask: ‘what are the current statuses of  the demons and witches the minister met in  our  power sector?’ Are they still living or dead? If they are still living, have they increased, decreased or remained the same in number and in power? I do not want to believe that the demons and witches in the sector have overwhelmed/overpowered the minister. I am aware that Professor Barth Nnaji, his predecessor, an erudite scholar of international repute and one of the inventors of E-Design, might have seen the so-called  demons  and witches in the sector and since he was not a priest, he honourably resigned.

What happened to the prepaid meters that were once introduced in some parts of the country? Why are the prepaid meters not evenly distributed? Why are workers still distributing the old analogue meters in this 21st century? Why is it so that when somebody pays for a meter, it takes so long before it is delivered and installed? Has there been any improvement in the 4000 megawatts the minister promised Nigerians?

Many companies are leaving our country for neighbouring countries due to power failure in our dear country. Alternative sources of power generation will increase the costs of production for these companies. When these companies leave our country, the workers that are laid-off will add to our pool of the unemployed. Why will the much-touted Africa’s largest economy not boast of at least 18 hours of electricity per day?

Having superintended over our power sector for more than two years now, can the minister honourably retract his statement that ‘uninterrupted power supply is not a mirage.’  Yes, gas pipeline vandalism has really affected our power generation but my question is, ‘did the minister not consider that before declaring his ‘spiritual’ warfare on the demons and witches in the sector?

•Dr Paul John

Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

•The NNPC audit revealed a reckless regimes handling our finances and we call for a new one

It was a gratuitous attempt to lay to rest the ghost of a seething scandal.

On Monday, President Goodluck Jonathan ordered the office of the Auditor-General of the Federation (AuGF) to unveil the findings of the PricewaterHouseCoopers (PwC) audit on Nigeria’s big pot, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC).

What came out was an anti-climax of a most horrendous cover-up, and a mockery of an investigation. It abused every standard of auditing integrity. It insults our sense of arithmetic with its addlebrained accounting. It reveals the failure of a political class that has turned the people’s patrimony into a private fiefdom.

At bottom, it tells why not enough drugs, not enough roads, not enough schools enjoy the benefits of our money. It was called a forensic audit when it was not. It was called comprehensive when it was comprehensive only in its failures.

It is the tragedy of a nation that a government elected by the people could turn the people’s wealth into a charade of public waste in the midst of characters in government noted for their vanities and impressario than serious business.

For an administration that has always maintained that it has nothing to hide, it was a travesty of transparency. The development only came after newspapers reported the resolve of the President –elect, General MuhammaduBuhari to reopen the chapter of the missing funds announced as $20 billion dollars, $10 billion or even lower.

Merely on the strength of the 16-week time-table announced by Finance Minister and Coordinator of the Economy, NgoziOkonjo-Iweala for the firm to conduct the exercise, the report ought to have been turned in last October particularly in the context of the rage fuelled by the allegation of the missing money. Instead, it fed Nigerians with a waiting game and chose February – barely few weeks to the election – for a mock show of public presentation. It was released not to the millions of the citizens who had sought to establish the truth of the matter and at whose instance the exercise was undertaken, but to the AuGF who, the President insisted, needed to work on the report ostensibly to help Nigerians understand its content! This was after the administration had cherry-picked and made public aspects of the findings that suited it.

If that approach was sneaky and reeled with hypocrisy, the release of the entire report has since confirmed our worst fears about the pervasive footloose accounting, the general lack of accountability and the brazen outlawry that have defined the operations of NNPC. More than that however is the administration’s culpability in the making of the grand larceny and the attendant bad faith while the so-called exercise lasted.

As it is, the PWC audit has itself raised more questions than address specific queries Nigerians had sought answers. To begin with, we are exasperated at the import of the third paragraph of the covering letter of the so-called audit to wit: “The procedures we performed did not constitute an examination or a review in accordance with generally accepted auditing standards or attestation standards.  Accordingly, we provide no opinion, attestation or other form of assurance with respect to our work or the information upon which our work was based”.

If we may dare to ask: Where lies the merit – or rather, the utility of an exercise whose authors would gleefully disclaim as falling short of generally accepted auditing standards? Does it not smack of an attempt by the investigators to play Pontius Pilate – a lie in the name of investigation!

Even more curious is the auditors own admission that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), shunned the auditors’ request for the bank statements. According to PWC, “up till the time of writing this report, our request for bank statements from CBN was not responded to”. It opted rather to rely “on the account statements obtained from other stakeholders to carry out our independent check on the remittances made”. It was an investigation with roots. Remittances could not betraced. It was a reconciliation audit to fulfil a fraudulent script.

Of course, it still went ahead to establish wide-ranging discrepancies in record and general book-keeping although it fell astoundingly short of naming culprits. Even when it had good leads to follow, it sought solace in the alibi of alleged institutional inscrutability.

Overall, the exercise touted as “forensic audit” and for which millions of taxpayers’ money was possibly paid, falls short of what was expected as set out in its scope of work.  We must say that we find nothing unduly restrictive in the scope of work viz; Analysis of remittance shortfalls from NNPC into the Federation Accounts; Analysis of submissions made by key stakeholders in relation to these alleged shortfalls; and, producing an independent Forensic report detailing our findings.

The issue is that there are too many gaps which a more diligent exercise could have filled; the same way that we find the ready recourse to alibis by a supposedly world-class professional body not only untenable but outrageous. That is why it is tempting to conclude that Nigerians were conned into assuming a perfunctory reconciliation exercise for a proper forensic investigation.

Moving forward, we can only hold the in-coming administration to its promise to revisit the entire audit exercise. In this, the PWC report can only be the starting point. At this stage, we can only urge that the firm be helped to complete the work that it started. Already, it has enough leads on the basis of which to proceed with the job. Perhaps, a good way to begin is for the incoming administration to get the identified uncooperative agencies to respond to the specific queries meant for them. We refer here to the CBN, the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Authority (PPPRA), and the Nigerian Petroleum Development Corporation – the prospecting arm of the NNPC whose operations not only remain shrouded in mystery but is known to act oftentimes outside of the ambits of the law.

How much did the nation actually lose? $20 billion or $10 billion? We wish anyone knew. Yet, it is not something we consider as impossible to establish. The same way the nation was able to establish the fuel subsidy scammers, the government only needs to look into its records to fish them out. The missing link has always been the political will to identify and prosecute those known to be behind the rape of the nation’s treasury. We expect things to be different this time. For once, Nigerians seek to identify those behind mismanagement of the nation’s patrimony if merely to put closure to the sordid era.

We must of course deprecate the role of a section of the media in trivialising the entire saga. Only the death of outrage would explain the mindless celebration of the disgrace that the PWC’s finding is. To say that only $1.5 billion – as against $20 billion – was indeed stolen is egregious folly. That a medium would dare to underplay the grand larceny would seem to us a case of moral abnegation.