The Nation Newspaper

Tag: emergency

  • Emergency with a difference

    Emergency with a difference

    •States’ wage bill crisis calls for  federalisation of workers’ pay

    SAMUEL Ortom, the governor of Benue State, has made a rather sensational declaration: a state of emergency on workers salary. Stripped of that dramatic lexis, that means everything else is in abeyance, until the workers’ salary arrears are cleared.

    That would be sweet music to the ears of Benue State workers, which could well fuel agitations for an encore in other states.

    Still, the idea of holding every other thing down to pay workers, as legitimate as that is, could be ruinous dirge in other ears. For one, government workers hardly constitute up to 10 per cent of every state’s population. In other states, it could be far less.

    So, holding up the care of nine, just to cater for a sole citizen (10 per cent is one out of every 10), is not especially just or equitable — with all due respect to the inalienable right to pay workers for work done. The salary crisis would therefore appear a classic case of unworkable economics, which needs a drastic change, and not just mere tinkering. That goes to the heart of Nigeria’s federalisation crisis — and the imperative to re-federalise fast.

    While Governor Ortom deserves praise for at least admitting the enormity of the problem, even if his recipe to tackle it is rather humanitarian than economic, how the state got to that sorry pass is an ugly window into how Nigeria’s notorious centralisation has conspired to impoverish everyone.

    The governor complained about the ”upward review of workers’ salaries” by the predecessor government. But let no one demonise that government for willfully burdening its successor with wanton bills. It too was a victim of a pan-Nigeria push to create the economically unworkable; call on the incumbent government to work magic and failing, lament that impossibility to high heavens.

    The salary crisis, pre-economic recession, piled up with organised Labour’s insistence to cut a central deal for workers nationwide, with little recourse to each state’s ability to pay. That is the illogic behind a uniform pay structure for civil servants, all over the country. The pretence could be kept up with pouring petro-dollar. But the moment that dried up, a vicious, ugly face glared at everyone.

    So, that is why Benue State could claim its monthly receipt from Abuja is N6 billion; while its wage bill is N8.5 billion. It either has to borrow to make good or declare painful force majeur. In human terms, that could be explosive. In cold economics, it is no less grim, for it is reinforcement of barrenness: if civil servants don’t receive regular pay, commerce grinds to a halt. It is the same logic, in all of the states plagued with salary backlogs.

    Governor Ortom’s “salary emergency” is welcome, although it would appear a short-term glory (even if it solves the problem), is traded for long-term agony (for infrastructure, needed to open up the state economy, would have stalled for some time).

    However the governor goes about tackling the issue, he should also try to cut down on the usual culprits: “ghost” workers and allied sleaze in the pay system; and also generally clean up the accounting space. This though, the governor claimed he had done.

    Still, a rational way to solve the problem, once and for all, is to push for the federalisation of workers’ pay. A civil servant in Makurdi need not receive the same pay with that in Lagos, with its roaring internally generated revenue. Nor would it be economically wise to pay a civil servant in Kano (with its buzzing commerce, and therefore higher tax returns for IGR), the same wage as the one in Kebbi.

    Therefore, states should summon the political will to face down Labour, when next it rolls into town, with its agitation for workers’ pay rise. Pay rises are no crime. But they should fall within what each state can afford, when linked with some productivity index.

    Nevertheless, the states can only do this after swallowing some rather bitter pills. To start with, they must find a formula to cut down on the huge bill of the political bureaucracy, as a show of good faith. After this, they must go ahead to remonstrate with their civil service bureaucracies, on the need to federalise, in tune with what is fair and what each state can afford. If that is well done, it would not only drive down the wage bill overall, it would provide states the cash, even if still limited, to face other developmental challenges, without which the states cannot make economic progress.

    That is the way to go to, once and for all, solve all this pay mess. But to pull it off, the states must muster enough political will. The people too should show enough understanding of the grim situation.

    But, with better federalisation, and each state or region having better control of its cash cows, it could well be the beginning of a competitive local economy, where every state or region would reserve the right to hike its workers’ pay, in tune with their gauged productivity and increased state or regional wealth.

  • Declare state of emergency on unemployment, says union

    Concerned over the alarming rate of unemployment in the country, the President of Association of Senior Staff of Banks, Insurance and Financial Institutions (ASSBIFI), Comrade Oyinkansola Olasanoye, has called on the Federal Government to declare a state of emergency on unemployment.

    Speaking with The Nation, Comrade Olasanoye said  the rate of unemployment was alarming, pointing out  that statistics  by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that over 27 million Nigerian youths were unemployed, while over 70 million people were under-employed.

    According to Olasanoye, the number is more than Ghana’s population and that of Benin Republic.

    “We are looking at a situation where we have a whole nation not employed in some other countries.”

    “So, we have over 27 million who live on less than a dollar per day, and we have over 70 million people under-employed; these are people who are working, but by international standard practice, earn far less than what they ought to.

    “This rate is alarming and notable Nigerians ought to talk about it. We understand that the government has done their bit to help Nigerians in reducing the state of unemployment in the country, but more needs to be done,” she said.

    She noted that Nigerians are suffering, and that the government should look at the issue more critically, adding that it is when the Federal Government declares a state of emergency on unemployment in the country that most unemployed youths would be employed.

    She said: “Young people entering the labour market today face the daunting task of first finding decent jobs and then keeping them when they do.

    “Unemployment rates are on the rise again. Indeed, two out of every five young women and men in the country are unemployed or working but living in poverty.

    “To be effective, however, government finances have to be in relatively good shape. Thus, as recession arrived since 2016, fiscal expansion should be implemented immediately, before the economic downturn itself leads to a significant worsening of the budget balance.

    “An example of such an approach is the Youth Guarantee programme, which was introduced in the European Union in 2014. It is intended to provide young people, who are neither working nor in education, with quality education, training or work. The Youth Guarantee is by its nature countercyclical, expanding during lows in the economic cycle when youth joblessness tends to rise”.

  • Malala seeks emergency in education sector

    Malala seeks emergency in education sector

    Acting President Yemi Osinbajo yesterday received Pakistani rights activist for girl-child education and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Malala Yousafzai at the Presidential Villa.

    The 20-year-old Malala, who was accompanied by her father Yousafzai and other members of the Malala Foundation, arrived at the presidential villa at about 5.30 p.m.

    The young female activist survived gunshots on her head by the Taliban for campaigning for girl-child education in Pakistan.

    She visited Nigeria in July, 2014, to campaign for the release of abducted Chibok schoolgirls, meeting with then President Goodluck Jonathan and parents of the more than 230 kidnapped Chibok schoolgirls.

    Malala urged the declaration of state of emergency in the education sector

    She said: “It was a very good meeting. We had a fruitful discussion with His Excellency, the Acting President.

    “I highlighted on the need to scale up education, that the government should declare a state of emergency in education because education of girls and boys in Nigeria is important.

    “The federal, state and local governments need to be united on this.” she added

    According to her, she also spoke on the child right act.

  • Emergency on education timely, says Sokoto govt

    Sokoto State Commissioner for Basic and Secondary Education, Dr. Muhammadu Jabbi Kilgori, says a state of emergency declared on the state education sector is to rapidly address infrastructural challenges, enrolment, retention of school age children and the girl-child education.

    Briefing reporters in Sokoto, Kilgori noted that government is fast tracking modalities for sustaining standards in the state education system.

    Kilgori also identified learning achievements, teacher quality and motivation, community and private sector participation as areas the state of emergency aims to reposition.

    According to Kiglori, the government had embarked on an aggressive enrolment drive, campaigning with rewards for outstanding achievement,

    Kilgori stated that the projected enrolment statistics between early childhood care education  and senior secondary schools in the state was at 1,908,099, but with a net figure of 738,034 as actual enrolment for the 2015/16 and 2016/17 seasons.

    “Given this statistics, a total of 1,170,065 are out of school,” he pointed out.

    To further encourage enrolment and  retention, Kiglori said the government has approved the establishment of a primary and junior school each across the 244 wards in the state.

    “Each ward will have a primary school and JSS totaling 488. We have so far constructed and renovated over 60 of such,” he said.

  • SNEPCo trains medical workers in emergency care

    SNEPCo trains medical workers in emergency care

    Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company (SNEPCo) has facilitated the training of medical workers from hospitals in Anambra State on emergency resuscitation, delivering a critical component of its commitment to providing skilled and timely response to emergencies in the state.

    The training of the 70 workers on Basic Life Support and Advanced Cardiac Life Support which took place at the Iyi-Enu Mission Hospital, Ogidi, according to Shell’s spokesman, Bamidele Odugbesan, was delivered by Emergency Response International, a body accredited by the American Heart Association for this specialised skill building.

    “SNEPCo is pleased to carry out these important trainings in Anambra State,” said Regional Community Health Manager, Dr. Akin Fajola. “Timely response to emergencies is a matter of life and death, and even then, deploying an unskilled medical staff to an emergency is itself an emergency. We now expect the 70 skilled responders to positively impact their areas of work in the state.”

    Speaking at the graduation ceremony, the Commissioner for Health in Anambra State, Dr. Josephat Akabuike, thanked SNEPCo for helping to save lives in medical emergencies by improving the skills of healthcare professionals.  A participant at the training, Dr. Nathan Elochukwu Ojekwu, said: “This initiative requires a lot of resources, but SNEPCo did it for free. I promise to put this training to good use by saving lives.”

    The training is a key aspect of the intervention of SNEPCo – with the active support of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and co-venture partners – in strengthening the quality of healthcare services at the Iyi-Enu Mission Hospital and emergency skills in Anambra State, which began in 2013. The intervention has also seen the commencement of breast cancer and dialysis services and the donation of medical equipment worth over N120 million.

    In addition to the project at Iyi-Enu Mission Hospital, SNEPCo developed the capacity of health workers in seven states in the South West and South South regions, and supported the BEARS Foundation for the repair of congenital cleft lip and palate. Late last year, thousands of residents in Lagos benefitted from a health outreach organised by SNEPCo, which offered free medical services and education at strategic areas in the mega city.

    In the past four years, SNEPCo worked with an NGO (Extended Hands) to undertake corrective surgery and treatment of over 150 women suffering from Vesical Vaginal Fistula (VVF) across the six geo-political zones.

  • Kebbi to declare state of emergency in education

    Kebbi to declare state of emergency in education

    Perhaps stung by the low number of Kebbi children competing for places in Federal Government colleges, Gov Atiku Bagudu , said he would declare a state of emergency in the education sector.

    He said the policy would improve teaching and learning in the state.

    The governor made the statement while addressing members of Kebbi Development Forum (KDF), an NGO in Birnin Kebbi on Sunday.

    He said education is the bedrock of development hence the resolve of his administration to rejuvenate the sector.

    Out of the 78,378 pupils that participated in the recent 2017 National Common Entrance Examination, to book places in unity colleges, Kebbi had the least number of candidates. It had 63, a sharp contrast with Lagos which had 24,816 candidates.

    Bagudu,who decried the low standard of education in the state, said his administration would work with stakeholders to transform the sector,adding,” We would improve upon the human capacity problems in all levels of education”.

    He said he would constitute a stakeholders “consensus committee’’ on education stressing that his administration would recruit more teachers, provide equipment to schools and improve teachers’ welfare.

    The chairman board of trustees of the forum,Alhaji Bala Sakaba said the forum was a non-partisan organisation formed to foster unity,generate ideals ,and programmes for acceleration socio economic development.

    He said the forum is involved in sensitisation and mobilisation of traditional rulers,religious leaders and the elite to act as agents of changes towards value reorientation.

    ” it is our belief that for any society to develop, its citizens must be sensitised, to enable informed and enlightened decisions such as demand for services and accountability from their elected representatives”.

    Sakaba,called on public institutions to be dedicated and transparent in rendering services to the people and urged people to support efforts by leaders to bring development.

    Justice Usman Muhammad, formerly of the Supreme Court, who chaired the occasion lamented the backwardness of the state in education and tasked stakeholders to assist resolve the problem

    ”The knowledge attained through education creates opportunities for better prospects in career growth”,he said.

    A committee member, Dr Aisha Adamu called on the state government to be more committed towards promoting girl child education,adding,” if you educate a woman you educate the nation”.NAN

  • Icon returns with Emergency

    Icon returns with Emergency

    Budding song writer, vocalist and performing artiste, Icon, has dropped a new track titled Emergency under the imprint of 2Digits Records.
    Produced by Flyfree, mixed and mastered by Indomix, the track has been described as an afro street song. The dancehall song talks about a young man who is miffed by his girlfriend and taken over by a witty guy at a party. Emergency is presently gaining massive airplay.
    The artiste has decided to choose the big industry players, Akon and the late Michael Jackson as his role models, and when he was asked who he will choose as his fondest Nigerian artiste to possibly do a collabo with, he mentioned 2Baba, rapper MI and Davido  as those very dear to his heart.
    2Digits is a fast rising music Management Company offering musical artistes and professionals a deal in music recording, publishing and marketing all around artistes’ management.
    The music company, which set out in 2015 under the aegis of Mr Adedokun Abiola, has now hit the ground running unveiling the works of different artistes, one of whose new track is Emergency.

  • Types of emergency

    The terms of the federal government touted economic emergency, in my view, will only scratch the economic crisis we currently face because Nigerians have a poor emergency culture. For the crafty especially the privileged, a state of emergency is an opportunity to exploit the system, not a time for selflessness. So, they crave disorder and panic. If it fails to materialize, they invent one for in emergency, they thrive.

    The best reflection of who we are is our behaviour in the traffic.  Once chaos starts, the public official who should make the traffic work turns it into an emergency and with a siren meant only for emergency, he glides through it. If you don’t allow him an easy escape, he orders his security to force his way. After himsteps in the vagabonds whose SUVs also blare the siren like a state official, an ambulance or a fire fighter.

    The siren also suits their ego. With the sound of siren, law enforcement agencies throw their salute while other road users scamper off. That is what will happen if emergency powers are donated beyond thestandard for every other person. If we create a special window, the vagabonds and the privileged will ride through it to further mess up the economy while the genuine businesses are clogged down.

    The use of executive fiat, to grant foreign exchange subsidy for religious tourism, is an example of the chaos the so-called economic stabilization powers will be used for. So, while genuine businesses are allowed to drag through the chaos of sourcing foreign exchange, the emergency powers will be abused to grant the privileged power merchants and the vagabonds, an opportunity to rake in billions of dollars without work, as in the days of the import licence rackets.

    Instead of the privilege of a siren for a few, what we need is law and order for every business, while the opportunities are quickly expanded. In my view, the first emergency we should make laws for, is one to allow states more economic opportunities. The central government has excessive powers and potential resources. So, we need emergency constitutional amendment, to empower states to exploit the opportunities lying fallow in their states, while they wallow in penury.

    The President should therefore call an expanded National Economic Council, made up of the Federal Executive Council, leaders of the National Assembly, governors, leaders of the state legislative assemblies, organised labour, leaders of important professional organisations and party leaders, to agree on emergency constitutional amendment to expand the economic opportunities in Nigeria.

    One example. It is a national folly to designate several abandoned expressways, federal highways, when common sense dictates that some states can take it over, repair and toll it so that work is created and the road users can have respite. Also states and clusters of states should have rights over railways. The emergency laws should be how to help the states prosper. But of course, we need emergency amendments of our laws to give the states the teeth and more economic resources to take over these responsibilities.

    The expanded National Economic Council should also determine how to allow the states explore the mineral resources in their states. Few days ago, former President Olusegun Obasanjo visited Taraba State, and was reporting that the state is greatly endowed with mineral resources. This is true of many states in Nigeria. Ondo State is reputed to have huge deposits of bitumen, yet the state owes workers. About 28 states owe workers, despite their endowments. It is foolish.

    For me, any emergency law not geared towards the release of states to engage in greater productive activities is misplaced. As I have argued severally on this page, the federal government, particularly the government of ethically favoured President Muhammadu Buhari owes every part of the country economic development. The plan to cheaply access the Universal Basic Education fund is merely a proposal to spend saved resources, not how to create wealth.

    So, the President should encourage regional economic integration, joint projects in transportation, agro-allied industrialization, inter-state commerce, joint electricity projects, among several others. The touted emergency proposals will merely provide opportunities for the greedy hawks around him, to further ridicule his economic credentials. Competition is the game, not privileged opportunities for a few.

    As the president ought to know, the multi-layered crisis plaguing Nigeria revolves around diminishing economic rights and opportunities. Whether it is the Boko Haram crisis, or the Niger Delta insurgency, or the Fulani invasions, or even the agitation for Biafra, the underlying propellant for all the crisis is a failed economy. Take the hotbeds of the Biafra agitation, Onitsha and Aba; they are the dying economic nerve centres of the South-east.

    To stem the crisis, the economies of those centres have to be re-energised, just as the Lake Chad water has to be restored to stem the Boko Haram crisis. The armed herdsmen need to be taught new tactics to rear their cattle. Cattle rearing should be turned to business. So, an Ijaw, Fulani, Hausa, Igbo, Yoruba, Itsekiri or any willing Nigerian, can decide to engage in cattle rearing as a business. That will save lives and properties currently worth a penny for gun-trotting herdsmen.

    Another emergency law we need is one to stop the legislature and the executive the unsustainable opportunity to continue to plunder our national resources. For the executive arm of government, they must come to terms with the unsustainability of the so-called security vote. Also the legislature, particularly the National Assembly, must stop the crazy appropriation of huge chunks of the national budget for themselves.

    One thing the president can do immediately is to recruit competent economic managers. Those currently in charge are not delivering. So, we need new hands and heads. The president must also realize that some of his trusted aides are helping themselves instead of the country. The mere fact that those aides were with him during the difficult years is not enough reason to give them more responsibilities than they can handle. Some of them are also corrupt.

    Our country is seething with despair. In the rural arrears, the insecurity of unsafe farm lands, because of armed herdsmen, has aggravated poverty. They also attack on the highways. I was a victim last Thursday. Luckily, I escaped just by the whiskers. Around 7pm, between Udi town and the 9th Mile corner in Enugu State, the vehicle I was in ran into a road block by a bend. Luckily the armed men panicked, as our driver swung the vehicle and turned back the way we came.

    I consider my escape a miracle. God’s grace. I later learnt the attacks happen regularly. The fingers point at herdsmen. Our villages are also dying in the hands of petty thieves. Soup pots, a gallon of palm oil, a television set, and sundry items have become victims of the searing poverty. While a woman is away to sell a prized cock to buy soup ingredients, her house is raided and her garri is stolen. Danger and despair reigns. Youths roam. No work. No opportunities. Relations who use to send some money remain incommunicado.

     

  • No need for emergency powers for economy

    Sir: The Democratic People’s Congress strongly opposes President Muhammadu Buhari’s bill to the National Assembly seeking emergency powers to tackle economy now in recession.

    Buhari claimed that the objectives of the emergency stabilization bill 2016 are to shore up the value of the naira, create more jobs, boost foreign reserves, revive the manufacturing sector and improve power supply.

    These are exactly the economic issues Nigerians voted President Buhari to effectively tackle with the executive powers conferred on him in the 1999 constitution as amended.

    Unfortunately, instead of taking governance seriously and diligently handle these and other crucial national issues, the APC-led federal government from the outset started playing to gallery and exhibited leadership fatigue to the shock of longsuffering Nigerians who expected change in their standards of living.

    Any attempt to give the President more powers will lead to tyranny and autocracy which is unacceptable in a democracy. Buhari did not seek extra power to crush Boko Haram insurgency and will not need emergency powers to revamp the economy.

    DPC has repeatedly called for an economic team made up of eminent Nigerians to proffer solutions to the dwindling economic fortune of the nation. Instead of doing this, the Buhari government allowed itself to be distracted by intra-party war over the leadership of the National Assembly etc.; it took the government almost what seemed like eternity to constitute the Federal Executive Council and present the 2016 budget with its purported padding.

    To make matters worse, the Central Bank of Nigeria has been having a field day with its policy summersaults that have confused local and foreign investors. Today the dollar is sold for N402.00.

    The government should sit up and do the right thing. Diversification of the economy is critical for the survival of our frail democracy and it starts with sound economic policies and actions.

     

    • Rev. Olusegun Peters

    National Chairman, DPC

  • Does Buhari need emergency powers?

    Does Buhari need emergency powers?

    This paper, The Nation, reported on its front page on Monday, August 22, that, on the advice of his economic (advisory) team, President Muhammadu Buhari is seeking emergency economic powers to tackle Nigeria’s sluggish economy. An enabling economic stabilisation bill giving him wide emergency powers is to be sent shortly to the National Assembly for its deliberation and passage. The details of the enabling bill have not yet been made public, but the paper hinted that the emergency economic powers President Buhari is seeking will be sweeping and wide ranging, and could cover fiscal and monetary policies as well. The proposed emergency economic powers will be justified on the grounds that our economic recovery has been rather slow and that a shot in the arm, through emergency powers for the president, is now needed to move our country out of its recession speedily. The proposed bill will, of course, have an easy passage in the APC-controlled National Assembly.

    But I find the claim that the president needs extra powers to tackle our economic problems astonishing. It is perfectly understandable that his Economic Team, out of frustration with the sluggish economic recovery, should urge the president, who is just as frustrated, to seek wider emergency powers to tackle the sluggish economy. But are the new emergency and extensive powers being proposed for the president really necessary? Does he not already have all the powers he needs to move our country forward? Will the granting of such wide powers to the president by the National Assembly lead to a better management of the economy and turn it round? Will it create more jobs? I do not think so. In fact, I consider it dangerously delusional. It is a populist economic strategy that will attract some support from the public who, in their desperation, will clutch at any straw now in the hope for a dramatic transformation of the economy after decades of neglect and mismanagement. But I do not think that giving the president wider emergency powers and impunity over the economy now will produce any significant change in the economy. He knows he does not have a magic wand to accomplish that. The president has himself admitted several times publicly that there are no ‘quick fixes’ to the grave economic challenges facing our country and that more time is needed to tackle these challenges. In fact, in the absence of any clear and coherent economic strategy by the government, giving the president emergency powers now over the economy could be counterproductive and lead to more chaos and public frustrations with the management of our domestic economy. We should avoid having to act out of desperation.

    To start with, as is well known, Nigeria’s economic problem is really structural and deep seated. It has more to do with its over dependence on oil revenues and our failure over the years to make the necessary public investments to diversify our country’s economic structure away from its dependence on oil revenues which, recently, has fallen by over 60 per cent. It is unlikely that recovery from the decline in oil revenues will occur soon. There is a global economic recession and a consequent fall in the global demand for oil. Due to the insurgency in the Niger Delta, Nigeria’s oil production has fallen from 2.2 billion barrels a day to only 1.5b. Its main competitors in oil exports, such as Venezuela, Iran, Angola and Saudi Arabia are in full production even when global oil demand is falling. So, wider economic emergency powers for the president will not lead to more oil exports or revenue for Nigeria, even if the Delta returns to normalcy.

    In addition, some of the nagging economic problems for which the president is being urged to seek wider powers can more easily be addressed by mere administrative measures. These include the delay in the granting of Nigerian visas for prospective foreign investors, the education fund, mobilisation funds for local contractors, and the existing procurement process. All these do not require additional powers for the president. Where it is necessary to amend the existing constitutional procedures to deal with these problems, this can be done by the Executive presenting the necessary amendment bills to the National Assembly, rather than by seeking new and sweeping economic powers for the president.

    For instance, in the case of mobilisation fund for contractors, it was reported that the president will be seeking to increase it from 15 per cent to 50 per cent. I consider this proposal an outright prescription for financial and economic disaster in our country. Many contractors will simply collect the 50 per cent mobilisation funds and walk away from the project. It will be difficult for the government to recover such funds from the contractors, particularly as most of the beneficiaries of such funds are likely to be party hacks who, in the first place, secured the contracts on the basis of party political patronage. In most cases the governments award the contracts as a means of funding their political parties. They are then obliged to turn a blind eye to the failure of these political contractors to complete the projects for which they received mobilisation funds. It is rare in our country for the government to take defaulting contractors to court for defaulting on contracts. The matter is simply swept under the carpet in view of the political stakes involved, and its potential for generating political scandals. As we have seen recently from the ongoing EFCC investigations into public corruption, the Jonathan PDP federal government fraudulently awarded a vast number of such phony contracts to its political supporters. This is a situation that must be avoided at all costs, as increasing the mobilisation funds of the contractors will not solve the problem of lack of financial accountability. It will make it worse. The existing financial rules regarding the procedure for the award of public contracts are quite adequate and should take care of the concerns of the government about the non-completion of public contracts.

    With regard to the existing public procurement process that the federal government is now seeking to change, it should not be forgotten that the current process was introduced to curb the irresponsible and corrupt manner in which public agencies were making procurements. The whole business was riddled with corruption leading to massive loss of public funds. The complaint now is that the procurement process is too long and that it is responsible for delays in the implementation of public projects. But the problem really is that applications for public procurements are usually delayed by the bureaucracy so as to stampede the procurement agencies into granting hasty approvals. In some cases lack of funds causes the delay in procurement. But there is no question that the existing procurement process has worked reasonably well. Large savings of public funds have been made by the insistence that due process be followed in public procurements. Scrapping it now and transferring the responsibilities to the president, or his designated officials, is likely to cause more delay and worsen public corruption in our country.

    The Organised Private Sector (OPS) was reported as being in support of the proposed emergency economic powers for the president. This is not altogether surprising as the business community, which was apparently consulted on the issue of the proposed emergency powers, tends on the whole to support draconian measures in times of economic recession. But I know from personal experience that it is a decision it usually regrets later as sweeping economic powers for the president may be detrimental to the real economic and financial interests of industry. It is no guarantee for speedy economic growth and has the potential of even dividing the business community. During the long period of military dictatorship in our country the military rulers virtually enjoyed unlimited and untrammelled emergency powers over the domestic economy. Institutional checks and countervailing forces against public corruption and the abuse of such wide powers were simply swept aside by the military. This trend which was inherited by the succeeding civilian governments accounts to a large extent for the economic mess in which our country now finds itself. The truth of the matter is that because of its lack of accountability, military rule set our country back by several decades. Vital decisions on investments in our infrastructure were not made. For instance, the introduction of import licensing by the first Buhari military regime was grossly abused by senior military officials placed in charge of the Import Licensing Committees. The import licences went to the wrong people who then sold them to genuine importers at highly inflated prices. Recently, President Buhari claimed publicly that one of the reasons his military government was overthrown in 1983 was that he was going to deal with this abuse by some of his senior military colleagues. When Babangida was in power, he too introduced and fraudulently granted import duty waivers to the wrong importers as well. These selective import duty waivers killed many local industries. The concern here is not that, if granted, PMB will himself abuse his emergency powers. Rather it is that his subordinates cannot be trusted by the public to ensure a fair and level-playing field under such emergency powers. Giving the president such sweeping powers over the economy could undermine our fledgling and fragile democracy and our economic rights. In any case even without additional emergency powers the President of Nigeria is powerful enough to steer the economy in the right direction without demanding additional powers which will, almost certainly, be abused to our economic detriment. He is one of the most powerful leaders in the world.

    But the most compelling reason for urging the federal government to have a rethink on the issue of emergency economic powers for the president is the suggestion that he should be directly responsible for determining monetary policy. This could justifiably be viewed as another negation of fiscal federalism in our country. Specifically, it was mentioned in the media reports that exchange rate adjustment strategy will come under the President’s purview. This has to be speculative as I cannot imagine a more dangerous prescription for our economy than the proposal to transfer the constitutional responsibilities of the CBN regarding exchange rate management directly to the president. It is this kind of currency manipulation by the leaders of countries, such as Venezuela and Zimbabwe that has destroyed their economies.

    The world, including Russia, China and India, has moved away, rightly, from excessive state control of the economy to a more liberal strategy based on the effective functioning of state institutions. Awareness of this positive trend is reflected in our more recent economic plans and strategy, such as the MDGs and vision 2020. State controls are often arbitrary and tend on the whole to discourage local and foreign investors due to their inherent economic flip flops and uncertainties. The spectacular economic transformation of countries, such as India, China and Brazil is sufficient illustration of the efficacy of a liberalised and market-based economy in achieving faster economic growth.

    Even in Africa, more and more countries are moving away increasingly from state controls to a free economy with the necessary adjustments. If maintained, the war against public corruption in our country will restore some economic sanity to our country. Instead of giving the president wider emergency economic powers, what the country needs are reformed state and public institutions that can be relied upon to function more effectively. A continuation of the reform of state institutions to make them more effective and efficient is what is needed, instead of resorting again to a command economy that has not served our nation well in the past. It will be a case of one step forward and two backwards.