The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Brexit

  • The beauty in Brexit

    ven with the seismic effects of the recent Brexit vote by Great Britain, the beauty of democracy glitters through. The crunch line is: voters made their choice. Only that the choice has left the Queen’s domain with such a nasty hangover that many now rue the decision and must be wondering if they sleepwalked through the referendum penultimate Thursday rather than make a reasoned and intelligent choice.

    Following a heated campaign by opposing camps in the course of which Labour Member of Parliament (MP) Jo Cox was murdered, voters in the June 23 referendum chose to pull the United Kingdom out of the European Union (EU), ending its 43-year membership of the bloc. But that decision was only by a slim margin of victory (52% to 48%) for Eurosceptics over those who preferred the status quo. It was also a neatly polarising decision among the four constituent states of the United Kingdom. Voting in support of Brexit were England (53.4% ‘Leave’ votes to 46.6% who chose ‘Remain’) and Wales (52.5% to 47.5%), while Scotland (62% ‘Remain’ to 38% ‘Leave’) and Northern Ireland (55.8% to 44.2%) strongly favoured remaining in EU. The poll’s aftermath has been like unleashing hell’s fury on the Queen’s country. But citizens made the choice. They must live with the consequences that choice and ride out the storm that has been ignited by it. That is what democracy is all about.

    The Brexit vote has left the country in leadership and economic disarray, and with resurgent threat to its national unity. As things stand, Britain looks effectively leaderless. For a country where power alternates strictly between two dominant parties, Prime Minister David Cameron of the ruling Conservative Party, who lost out in the referendum, has served notice of his resignation. Opposition Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, is hanging in only by the teeth in defiance of a mass revolt by Labour MPs who voted 172 to 40 to pass a no-confidence vote on him. He looks formatted to loose in a leadership challenge by members of his party.

    Meanwhile the referendum’s outcome has once again stoked nationalist temperament in that country. The Brexit vote rankles with the Scots, who voted only in 2014 to remain a part of the United Kingdom.Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said it was “democratically unacceptable” that Scotland faced being taken out of the EU when it voted to remain in the bloc. She signalled that a second Independence referendum for the country was “highly likely.” Northern Ireland, for its part, was reported to be considering a reunion with kindred Republic of Ireland, which is a Euro-spending dyed-in-the-wool member of the EU.Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness said the whole island of Ireland should now be able to vote on reunification.

    Beyond the political chaos, the shock Brexit vote impacted rudely on the economic front. The uncertainty stemming from the vote sent the British pound and stocks on London’s FTSE tumbling, though the stocks rallied again some days after. As Britain reeled from the fallouts of the Brexit vote and the international community watched fretfully, Prime Minister Cameron said he would leave invoking Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty, which is a condition to begin divorce talks with the EU, to his successor expected to take office in October. But the country was pressed by the 27 remaining members of the EU to make haste in giving practical effect to voters’ choice to exit the bloc. In other words, Cameron and some other leaders of Britain may have desired otherwise,voters made their choice in the referendum, and that choice must be duly and speedily respected.

    I see a few morals in the British referendum for the practice of democracy, despite its cataclysmic side effects. The campaign leading up to the June 23 vote showed that politicians could rise above narrow partisan loyalties and self-serving considerations to canvass convictions on what they considered best, rightly or not, for their country. The Brexit campaign made emergency allies of historical foes, and fierceadversaries of party mates. Prime Minister Cameron wanted Britain in the EU and earlier on negotiated concessions from the bloc to strengthen his hand. He called the June 23 referendum primarily to stamp down Europhobes like former London Mayor Boris Johnson in the Conservative Party, which declined to adopt a collective position on the debate. But while Cameron contended with opposition from within his party, in addition to others without, he found an unusual ally in opposition Labour Party, among others, which adopted an official stance favouring Britain’s stay in the European bloc.

    On the other hand, nearly the fiercest advocate of Brexit was the UK Independence Party (UKIP), which won the last European elections and had held a seat in the European Parliament for some 16 years. When UKIP leader Nigel Farage returned to EU Parliament in Brussels in the wake of the Brexit vote, some parliamentarians could not help questioning him on why he returned, in view of his strong advocacy against Britain’s membership of the bloc.

    One lesson from the Brexit vote for Britain’s political elite, just as well as for politicians in all true democracies, is that voters’ darkest – perhaps irrational – fears must be reckoned with. You do not dismiss voters’ concerns as unfounded and hope to get their support in elections, unless by crooked means as is common in our own context here in Nigeria.

    With all the benefits of access to a single market that membership of the EU conferred on Britain, the average citizen seemed to detest the “free movement” principle of the bloc, wanted their county to take back full control of its borders and limit immigration. It didn’t seem to count thatthe open border principle also meant citizens of Britain could freely emigrate to, and pursue their enterprise in any country within the bloc. Following the Brexit vote, EU leaders have been warning that Britain would not be allowed to negotiate for the beneficial single market access while avoiding the allied responsibility of free movement.

    Under U. K. laws, the June 23 referendum is not legally binding and could in principle be blocked by the country’s parliament. Parliament yet has to pass the laws that will get Britain out of the 28-nation bloc, starting with the repeal of the 1972 European Communities Act.The withdrawal agreement also has to be ratified by Parliament. In principle, the House of Lords and/or the Commons could vote against ratification. But that isn’t likely to happen in practice. In deference to voter’s choice, the government will move for Brexit in Parliament, and Conservative MPs who had voted ‘Remain’ will be ‘whipped’ to align with the government. Any MP that defies the whip must be ready to face the wrath of voters at the next general election.

    One scenario that could see the referendum result overturned is if MPs forced a general election and a party that promises to keep Britain in Europe gets elected. Such party could claimthat the election mandate supersedes the referendum mandate. But it requires the votes of two-thirds of British MPs to force a general election before the schedule date in 2020.

    The beauty in Brexit is that voters hold all the aces, and political leaders must simply submit to what they want. It will be the day here in Nigeria when politicians defer to voters and do not seek to circumvent them through electoral brigandage or judicial ambush. That will be the day!

  • Is it the same thing to be against Brexit as to be against the breakup of Nigeria? Yes, but…

    Is it the same thing to be against Brexit as to be against the breakup of Nigeria? Yes, but…

    Interestingly, the first returns on the night of the Brexit vote on Thursday, June 23, were for the “Remain” campaign, not the “Leave” irredentists. As a matter of fact, by the time that I went to bed around midnight, it was still far from clear that “Leave” would eventually have the massive victory that would stun the whole world the next morning. I of course did not wait until the next morning to find out how the referendum had gone; not being able to sleep without knowing how things were going, I woke up around 2:00 a.m. to the startling confrontation with a trend that indicated clearly, unambiguously that “Leave” was on its way to victory.I think it was at that moment that I began to reflect on both the clear and the rather fuzzy, obscure reasons why this Brexit referendum meant so much to me, specifically why I was so shocked, so troubled by the victory of the “Leave” side. Nearly a week later, this essay is a resumption of the thoughts that began to form in my mind in the early hours of the morning after the referendum, Friday, June 24, 2016. Out of the these diverse, multiple and intractable thoughts, I wish to focus specifically on thoughts that pertain specifically on how large-scale, integrated and unifying national and transnational supra-states and institutions may or may not endure in the context of either capitalist or post-capitalist modernity. In other words, this focalization of my thoughts on Brexit rest ultimately on our country, Nigeria: will it or should it endure as a federation, a political and institutional integration of the many peoples, many ethno-nationalisms that constitute its being-in-the-world and being-in-time-and-history?

    For starters, some caveats in making this comparison are in order here. Like the European Union, Nigeria may be a pan-national federation of (ethno)national groups, but our constituent groups do not have the long historical and institutional self-consolidation of the member nations of the EU. Until fairly recent times, virtually all of the ethno-national groups in our country did not think of themselves as one unified, ethno-national community. More concretely and decisively, we do not have the wealth, the standards of living, the great historical head-start in nation formation that the each and all of the European countries have.  More pointedly, like the European nations, we may have had centuries of internecine warfare between and within each of the various ethnic and sub-ethnic groups in our part of the world, but we differ fundamentally from the Europeans in not having had the opportunity, the advantage or the will to plunder, despoil and colonize other people and continents on our way to becoming modern, capitalist nations. This of course does not confer any quotient of rectitude or humaneness on us over the Europeans; it only means that tragically, we were and still are at the receiving end of modern capitalism’s use of colonialism and imperialism to confer wealth and dominance to the European nations in particular and the West in general. Certainly, in the course of our brief encounter with and participation in capitalist modernity, we have done everything we could to match the Europeans in the barbarism and heartlessness of capitalist relations of production, without the benefits, the ameliorations, the reforms.

    If the careful reader has noticed that in these observations and reflections I have placed a great emphasis on modern capitalism, let me hasten to confirm that this is actually my intention. This is because both Brexit proponents and the defeated opponents take their political and ideological cues from crises in contemporary global capitalism, more precisely the intense antagonisms between capitalism and distinct, if as yet inchoate post-capitalist currents of politics, society and economy. Almost without exception, this dimension has been missing in virtually all the reporting and musings on Brexit that I have read in our newspapers and newsmagazines including one of the best, written by a friend and an old comrade, Jibrin Ibrahim in The Premium Times online. In plain language, what has been missing in many of the reports and reflections is the historic and institutional context of the EU and Brexit itself in neoliberal globalization and its fundamental discontents nearly everywhere in the world, our world: wealth is being generated on a totally unprecedented scale at the very time when poverty, hardship and insecurity are being produced within the ranks of the vast majority of the peoples of the planet. In institutional terms, the contradiction pertains to the struggles between regulated and unregulated capitalism. More concretely – and specifically in social terms – the fundamental struggle is over redistribution, the unique feature of the present historical period being the emergence and deepening of levels of poverty, joblessness and insecurity in Europe, in the West that, hitherto, we used to see only in the Third World. And in specifically, cultural terms, the antagonism is between, on the one hand, rising and expanding currents of transnationalism and cosmopolitanism and, on the other hand, revanchist, nostalgic and xenophobic dreams of a “Great” Britain, a Europe when the “foreigners” were in their own parts of the world, in their own countries. Lest we forget, let me remind the reader that the campaign for “Remain” in last week’s referendum in the U.K. for transnational integration and cosmopolitanism, though defeated, got a solid and quite respectable 48% of the vote. I for one would like to believe that this vote represented the collective voice of those who see present and future developments in Europe and the world tending towards a post-capitalist world.

    Will the vote for Brexit lead to the breakup of Britain? No one knows and no one can make a safe and reliable prediction on the matter. What is not in doubt is the fact that the historic and structural conditions under which the peoples of Britain became fellow citizens of the supra-state that is the United Kingdom are beginning to unravel in the wake of the Brexit referendum and things will never be the same again. No referendum has of course taken place or is likely to take place soon on the Nigerian project as a conglomeration, a federation of many ethnic nationalities. But we are perpetually on the brink of coming unstuck and going our separate ways, are we not? Even if Abuja and Aso Rock are not exactly comparable to the integrative powers of either Brussels or Whitehall in London, still no center of political and administrative authority and indeed, sovereignty, is as strong and entrenched as the oil-rich and oil-doomed Nigerian state. At any rate, the demands for devolution and re-federalization in our country have never abated in the entire 102 years of the amalgamation of Northern and Southern Nigeria. Indeed, these demands have become much louder and more insistent since the return to civil rule and formal democracy in 1999. Brexit, I suggest, provides an opportunity for exploring aspects of this issue that are hardly ever mentioned, let alone vigorously and honestly discussed.

    At a superficial level of comparison, neoliberal globalization is wreaking the same havoc in Nigeria with regard to vastly unequal distribution of wealth as in Europe and other regions, other zones of global capitalism in the world. This is because like the big, integrative emporiums of Brussels and London, the strong center in Abuja is the bedrockof theconsolidationof the wealth of the thousandsof haves at the expense of the tens of millions of the have-nots. Seven out of every ten Nigerians live below the absolute poverty line; if you expand this to include relative poverty and insecurity, the ratio jumps dramatically to nine out of ten Nigerians. But this level of comparison of neoliberalism in Nigeria with neoliberalism in the European Union is extremely imprecise and unhelpful. Whatever its critics may say about it, wealth in the EU is actually generated; in our country, it is simply consumed by and through unequal distribution. And quite remarkably, this is hardly ever brought into discussions of and agitations for devolution and re-federalization in our country.Because this is a crucial point, permit me to briefly and concretely expatiate on it.

    Whatever else we may miss in comparing Brexit and the demands for true federalism and the reduction of the strong center in Abuja and Aso Rock, we must not miss the total absence in the Nigerian case of a complete lack of interest in linking either the unity of the country or its devolution into loosely associated regions and zones with reform of neoliberal capitalism. Let me state this in unmistakably clear terms: all the actors and interest groups in our country, whether they want a strong center or a loose federation, are more or less invested in keeping the present economic and political inequality between the haves and the have-nots in place undisturbed and unreformed. The three key demands of the “federalists” in Nigeria are creation of more states; sharing of oil revenues on the basis of derivation and resource control; and the transfer of responsibility for things like education, the police force and customary affairs from Abuja to the regional zones and the states. Please note that this programme completely excludes reform of economic and structural inequalities between the wealthy and the poor, the powerful and the downtrodden throughout the country.We cannot, must not shrink from the terrible implication of this situation: under present conditions, whether the masses of our peoples throughout the length and breadth of the land live under a state with a strong center or a federation with a weak center, they will live under conditions of great economic and social injustice. This is the great difference of our Nigerian project with Brexit – even though we share the social and economic ravages of neoliberal globalization with the European Union.

    Biodun Jeyifo                                                                                                                             bjeyifo@fas.harvard.edu

  • Brexit: How Angela Merkel juggles Europe’s many crises

    Brexit: How Angela Merkel juggles Europe’s many crises

    Whether it’s tension with Russia, terrorism, the refugee crisis or Brexit, Europe looks to Merkel

    It’s been decades since a European leader has had to juggle as many crises under such extreme stress as German Chancellor Angela Merkel is doing right now.

    If only Brexit were her only torch in the air. But for the woman hailed last year as the “indispensable European” and “moral conscience of the continent,” the torches just keep coming.

    She’s the go-to leader who is called upon to handle Britain’s divorce filing to the west, Russia’s provocations to the east, and all seething economic and political stresses in between.

    Since the frenzy over Brexit broke out, she has been the vital compromise seeker. She was able to spare Britain the “get lost” reaction urged by more hardline EU members, but at the same time she crushed Britain’s wistful hopes of an amicable cost-free divorce that would see it retain most of its EU privileges without any of the responsibilities.

    Britain voted to break away from the EU on June 23, 2016, in the so-called Brexit referendum, toppling Prime Minister David Cameron and dealing a thunderous blow to the 60-year-old bloc that sent world markets plunging.

    Other leaders took similar stands, but coming from the thrice-elected chancellor of Europe’s economic powerhouse, looking as steady and deliberate as always, it had decisive clout.

    So all-consuming was the drama over Brexit that a half dozen other issues were temporarily in the shadows. The refugee crisis, terrorism and other challenges continue to roil national politics on the continent and give increasing force to populist protest parties of the right and left.

    Backlash

    Across the continent and especially inside Germany, the refugee crisis continues to cause shock waves months after Merkel stunned Europe with her arms-wide welcome of 1.1 million mostly Muslim newcomers. Merkel has appeared undeterred despite a backlash that has sent her popularity plummeting in the polls and exposed tensions in her government’s political alliance.

    One of the most serious — and overlooked — challenges in the past week was more evidence of rising new security tensions with Russia to the east.

    In June, NATO generals watched one of their largest joint exercises since the end of the Cold War, called Anaconda. It featured 31,000 NATO soldiers in Poland and on the Baltic Sea, as well as a separate exercise on NATO’s northeastern flank, which consists of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

    Scant attention was paid because of the Brexit drama, but the commander of the U.S. Army in Europe had a dire assessment of military realities after watching the exercises: there’s simply no way NATO can actually defend its northeastern flank for more than “36 hours.”

    “Russia could conquer the Baltic States quicker than we could get there to defend them,” Lt.-Gen. Frederick Hodges told German radio.

    Tensions have been building ever since Russia annexed Crimea in 2014 and supported the separatist rebellion in eastern Ukraine. NATO responded by increasing troop levels in Europe, including an extra U.S. brigade, and conducting more military exercises.

    Russian President Vladimir Putin has denounced those exercises while ordering massive Russian manoeuvres. NATO expects another major Russian exercise will be held during the alliance’s summit in Warsaw in July.

    Angela Merkel usually isn’t at the forefront of defence debates, but she recently made it clear she believes NATO should bolster its capacity in the east. She has also promised substantial increases in German military spending to answer Russian increases and modernization.

    ‘Shrill war cries’

    But just in the past few weeks, the issue created yet another firestorm for Merkel at home. No less than her own foreign minister blasted NATO exercises in eastern Europe as “warmongering.”

    “What we shouldn’t do now is to inflame the situation with loud sabre-rattling and shrill war cries,” Frank-Walter Steinmeier told the media.

    It was an astonishing statement that shows just how deeply divided Merkel’s government is about relations with Russia and the rising tensions. The issue has also divided the German people.

    Three days later, the chancellor hammered back that Germany would continue to engage in dialogue with Moscow but “new threats” mean NATO’s eastern territory must be strengthened. She also pledged Germany would play a larger role.

    This isn’t the first serious dustup that Merkel, of the conservative Christian Democrats (CDU), has had with her left-leaning Social Democrat partners, the SPD, nor will it be the last.

    Relations between Merkel and Putin have soured sharply. She appears to suspect, according to media reports, that Putin conspired with SPD members to split her coalition government as well as to encourage extreme right- and left-wing parties to keep anti-refugee tensions on the boil.

    Certainly the view of Merkel from Moscow seems hostile, which isn’t surprising since she’s one of the strongest Western backers of tough sanctions against Russia.

    Insofar as Moscow might welcome a weaker EU, the departure of Merkel would also likely please the Kremlin.

    Defy the odds

    But the chancellor isn’t backing off. She reportedly asked German intelligence to investigate alleged Russian disinformation campaigns in Germany. For good measure, she recently ensured sanctions against Russia were renewed for another six months despite the desire of some allies, including Italy and France, to let them die.

    Should Merkel, 61, defy the odds and earn an unprecedented fourth term as chancellor next year, she will be lonelier without Britain in the EU. She valued the U.K. as a strong liberal partner and cool head in a crisis.

    There’s now talk of a Berlin-Paris power axis in the EU, but her relations with France aren’t as close.

    As Europe’s longest serving leader, she knows her place in history is assured. She also knows that having passed the ominous 10-years-in-power mark, she’s reached the point where wise leaders often start planning their exit.

     

    • Culled from CBC News
  • Brexit: Tension over UK-EU trade negotiations

    Brexit: Tension over UK-EU trade negotiations

    UK and EU politicians are giving  very different accounts of how the UK’s Brexit negotiations should proceed.

    The EU’s Trade Commissioner, Cecilia Malmstrom, says the UK cannot begin negotiating trade terms with the bloc until after it has left.

    “First you exit then you negotiate,” she told BBC Newsnight.

    However, other EU Commission officials privately believe it is ‘inconceivable’ that trade talks would not start before the UK’s exit.

    One of the candidates to be next UK prime minister, Liam Fox, called Ms Malmstrom’s stance ‘bizarre and stupid’, saying the Brexit talks would include trade.

     At the EU summit this week the 27 government leaders – without the UK – agreed Brexit “divorce” talks should begin and end before any talks on a new settlement for the UK.

    Brussels sources said  there was a real determination among the leaders not to mix the two.

    The statement from the 27 said they wanted the UK to be ‘a close partner of the EU’. But they also spoke of an agreement to be ‘concluded with the UK as a third country’.

    The phrase ‘third country’ means the UK post-Brexit.

    Outside the EU, the UK would trade with the bloc under World Trade Organization rules, pending a possible new deal on free trade.

    WTO conditions would mean trade tariffs and non-tariff barriers, as the UK would no longer be in the EU single market.

  • Brexit: Investors turn to Africa

    With the recent referendum by the United Kingdom (UK) to leave the European Union (EU), many businesses with existing or planned investment interests in the UK have started turning to Africa.

    An Ecobank Group Research titled: Investment after Brexit: Africa is the Final Frontier, said the businesses were looking for new investment frontiers.

    The Group said the revelation was the core of the Middle Africa Fixed Income Currency and Commodities (FICC) Guidebook 2016, published by Ecobank.

    ‘’With the UK having voted in its recent referendum to leave the EU, many businesses with existing or planned investments in the UK will be looking for new investment frontiers.

    ‘’Africa’s move to diversify its economies and its rising consuming class are creating an array of new investment opportunities.

    ‘’Kenya, Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal, Ghana and Ethiopia are the best examples, with broad-based economic growth, young populations and rising urbanisation,’’ it said.

    According to a statement from the lender, the Middle Africa FICC Guidebook contained an economic outlook, overview of the key sectors in the region and a guide on 41 countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

  • Brexit

    •Now that Britain has left EU, it remains to be seen how the old colonial power holds its own in a fiercely more contentious world

    The decision of Great Britain to pull out of the European Union (EU) after months and years of dithering and threats came as a major surprise to analysts and scholars of international relations. It is seen essentially as a setback for the United Kingdom as its isolated economy is unlikely to march the great advances of Europe in a largely globalised world. The referendum that compelled the exit has already claimed its first casualty- Prime Minister David Cameron who has indicated his intention to resign.

    It is indeed paradoxical that a country like Britain, a leading western power in the forefront of promoting global integration that has strengthened the north against the south could be caught in this web. It wants an integrated world, but a loose Europe. This is contrary to the position of the other great European countries like Germany, France and Italy.

    It is unfortunate that Britain seeks relevance and privileges but is not ready for duties and responsibilities. The country seeks a parochial and isolationist outlook that would shut the doors against immigrants from weak and troubled European nations. This, to us, is a confirmation and resurgence of the selfish ideology that informed colonialism.

    Now that Britain is on its own, it has to worry about the implications for internal arrangement. Already, Scotland that voted more than 60% to remain in Europe has indicated that it might have to re-examine its position within the United Kingdom. The Scottish people believe that remaining in Europe offers them some form of protection and one of their key leaders has indicated that they may have to seek another poll to determine their future. The idea of an independent Scotland may no longer seem as distant as it looked after the last poll. It will equally be interesting to see how the people of Northern Ireland, majority of whom voted to remain in Europe, would take the development. Could the Irish people in the North and South be encouraged to come together now? Wales is unlikely to beat the autonomy drum. All these have their implications for Britain’s political stability and, consequently, its economic well-being.

    The measured response from the United States of America (USA) was to be expected. At the moment, the great powers in the current world economic order are USA, Europe, China and Japan. Britain’s exit from the EU further pushes it down from the pecking order, thus making it less useful to offer assistance and protection to its old weaker traditional allies in the developing countries. One of such allies is Nigeria that has always seen the old colonial master and leader of the Commonwealth of Nations as a natural leader. In the contest against francophone and Portuguese African countries, Nigeria had always felt safe with Britain within the European Union. From now, Nigeria’s diplomats have to devise new strategies of attracting support at the global stage. The feeble campaign for permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council is likely to further weaken now as the francophone countries are likely to group together behind one of their own. It is an indication that Nigeria must put its house in order if it is to be respected within the comity of nations.

    We do not accept, as some have suggested, that the development could affect support for Nigeria’s war against terrorism. At the multilateral level, the world has come to accept that it is a case of injury against one being injury against all. With the murderous and unrelenting push by the Islamic states and Al-Shabab ideologues it is inconceivable that the world would watch Boko Haram slice up Nigeria. And at the bilateral level, Nigeria has signed agreements with world powers like USA, China and the EU. We believe these relationships subsist.

    We hope that Britain will find the least disruptive way of sorting out its problem in the years ahead. However, the lesson for us is that Nigeria has all the potentials to stand on its own in the same way that countries like China and India have pushed themselves up the international, social, political and economic ladder.

  • ‘Brexit ’ll not affect Nigeria’s economy’

    The outcome of Britain’s exit from the European Union (EU) may have triggered some measure of uncertainty and anxiety in the global economy, but its impacts on the Nigerian economy will not be profiund, the Lagos Chamber of Commerce & Industry (LCCI), has said.

    LCCI Director-General Mr. Muda Yusuf said Britain accounts for only 4.4 per cent of Nigerian global trade, while the EU accounts for 38.8 per cent. He argued that it is, therefore, unlikely that Brexit will have a material impact on Nigeria’s balance of trade.

    Yusuf said if anything, the trade between Nigeria and Britain would further improve on account of the likely depreciation of the British pounds and the affinity with Britain within the context of the Commonwealth.

    He also reiterated the fact that Nigeria is yet to sign the EU Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA), which also reduces Nigeria’s exposure to shocks from the EU economy, especially from a trade perspective.

    On the effect on Diaspora remittance, the LCCI boss said the current sentiments in Britain are to adopt tougher stance on immigration issues. According to him, with over one million Nigerians in the United Kingdom (U.K.), Nigeria is also a major recipient of Diaspora remittances in Africa.

    He, therefore, said the unfolding scenario might have some adverse implications for remittances by Nigerians in the United Kingdom (U.K.). “This will happen from the perspectives of tougher immigration regulations and enforcement as well as the likely slowdown of the British economy,” Yusuf said.

    While emphasising that the impact of Brexit on the Nigerian economy is unlikely to be profound, he said besides, negotiations will still take the next two years.

    “Most of the current responses are driven by uncertainties and expectations, which will fizzle out in the not too distant future, he said.

    The LCCI DG, however, said the British economy, which is worth $3 trillion, is the fifth largest in the world and the second largest within the EU, which makes it a major component of both the global economy and that of the EU.

    “Naturally, therefore, shocks to the British economy will have some transmission effects on the global economy. This perhaps informed the immediate responses of global and domestic financial markets,” he said.

    He added that this dimension of the impact is unlikely to endure as they are responses driven by expectations and uncertainties.

    He also suggested that the British economy will suffer some setbacks arising from the resultant weakening of investors’ confidence within the economy.

    “Brexit implies that investors within the British economy will no longer have free access to the EU market of over $16 trillion and a market size of over 500 million people,” he added.

    He said this would reflect in the strength of the currency as there is a relationship between the strength of the currency and the robustness of an economy.

  • Cameron’s fantastic Brexit gamble

    SIR: The Britain’s vote to leave the European Union has precipitated a trajectory towards economic recession in Britain and also tentatively cast a shadow over the global economy.

    Political pundits have argued that David Cameron and his colleagues had suffered from their short-sightedness that resulted in their self-inflicted defeat and political disaster when they called for referendum on EU.

    The Brexit is an evidence of global submission to anger, frustration and centrifugal proclivities especially among the younger voters across the globe.

    The same narrative is trailing the orchestration of Donald Trump’s candidature in the forthcoming presidential election in the U.S.

    Just as Brexit protagonists would discountenance every other merit imbued in a globalised politics by taking a myopic view on domestication of employment and foreign aids, the American “TrumpXits” are likely to carry the day in the forthcoming election not because Donald Trump is a better candidate than Hillary Clinton, but because of the new shift in global democracy from a centripetal political structure towards exiguous and prebendal permutations.

    Whilst the Brexit would accentuate the vestige of democratic nuances which puts the ascendancy of number above the most logical metrics, the Nigerian situation demands a different paradigm.

    First of all Britain did not join the EU through the instrumentality of war with any member of the EU and her exit through referendum was peacefully executed. The Nigerian sovereignty has been challenged on several occasions by separatists whose agenda for a new sovereignty have remained nebulous. For instance what is the ultimate aim of an Islamic state as demanded by Boko Haram? Can you grant the secession of a part of a sovereign state at the expense of another part? Can the Itsekirilive happily ever after with their Urhobokinsmen without a further call restructuring?

    The fundamentals that underlies Brexit rather negate the Nigerian experience and just like the ultimate gamble of David Cameron and his colleagues has consumed their political prospects leaving Britain with political and economic uncertainty, Buhari must be circumspect enough not to yield to centrifugal agenda. Moreover that the agitation for restructuring is getting more pronounced in the regime of anti-corruption is suspect. May be Professor Wole Soyinka and others should do more introspection.

     

    • BukolaAjisola,

    Lagos.

  • Brexit: EU warns UK on freedom of movement

    There can be no pick and choose single market for the United Kingdom, European Union leaders have warned, after meeting in Brussels to discuss Britain’s vote to leave the bloc.

    Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission, said anyone seeking access to the EU’s market must adhere to criteria “without exception.”

    There could be “no negotiation without notification,” he said.

    The German and French leaders and European Council President, Donald Tusk said the same, the BBC reports.

    Mr. Tusk said there would be another meeting of EU leaders, excluding the UK, on September 16 in Bratislava to discuss so-called “Brexit.”

    German Chancellor Angela Merkel also reiterated that there would be no discussions with the UK until Article 50 was formally triggered by the UK government.

    “We wish that that would happen as soon as possible,” she said.

     

  • Brexit vote is irreversible -Merkel

    Brexit vote is irreversible -Merkel

    Britain’s decision to leave the EU is irreversible, German Chancellor Angela Merkel says following summit talks in Brussels with British Prime Minister David Cameron and the bloc’s other leaders.

    “I see no way to reverse that,” Merkel says of the referendum outcome, while adding that the issue was not discussed with Cameron.

    “This is not the hour for wishful thinking the referendum stands as a reality, she said.

    “The atmosphere was serious, amicable and borne by the awareness that this is more of a sad event, but that it is a reality,” Merkel said of the leaders’ talks, noting that consequences now need to be drawn.