The nationwide petrol scarcity of the past one week was an embarrassment for a government facing elections in three weeks. Not even the hate rhetoric that has seized the 2015 campaigns can remove the fact that President Goodluck Jonathan owes Nigerians explanations over unfulfilled economic promises he made to the nation four years ago. In this piece, YUSUF ALLI, MANAGING EDITOR, NORTHERN OPERATION revisits the President’s sugar-coated promises and the extent to which he has fulfilled them.
Time flies. It is almost four years when President Goodluck Jonathan promised Nigerians Eldorado. Armed with a romantic story about a poverty-stricken childhood which saw him traversing Otuoke (his native home) and the shanties in Oguta, Nigerians rallied behind Jonathan in an unusual manner in the political history of the country.
His 2011 presidential campaign nearly echoed the “Yes We Can” script of the US President, Barack Obama who was as unheralded as Jonathan. The goodwill was enormous to the extent that a certain Emmanuel Bamidele Orevba died while celebrating his victory. With almost first term in office completed, the economic story of Nigerians remains the same in spite of the usual thumbs-up rating of his team and political jobbers.
From the decrepit nature of Eagle Square in Abuja, especially the VIP Stand, where he was inaugurated to the killing fields of Bama, Nigerians have become more economically emaciated than they were in 2011.
What did Jonathan promise the nation?
In an emotional-laden inaugural speech on May 29, 2011, Jonathan asked Nigerians to start dreaming again of a new beginning. He pledged to: grow the economy, make electricity available to all citizens; fight for an efficient and affordable public transport system for all our people; create jobs, rebuild infrastructure, provide access to quality education and improve health care delivery; put in place appropriate policy support to the real sector of the economy, so that small and medium enterprises may thrive.
He equally pledged to create a Nigerian Sovereign Investment Authority which will contribute to strengthening our fiscal framework, by institutionalizing savings of our commodity-related revenues; to avoid the boom and bust cycles, and mitigate our exposure to oil price volatility. He promised to pay special attention to the agricultural sector, to enable it play its role of ensuring food security; push programs and policies that will benefit both local and foreign businesses.
He actually said: “The time for lamentation is over. This is the era of transformation. This is the time for action… Let us all believe in a new Nigeria. Let us work together to build a great country that we will all be proud of. This is our hour. Fellow compatriots, lift your gaze towards the horizon. Look ahead and you will see a great future that we can secure with unity, hard work and collective sacrifice. Join me now as we begin the journey of transforming Nigeria. I will continue to fight, for your future, because I am one of you. I will continue to fight, for improved medical care for all our citizens. I will continue to fight for all citizens to have access to first class education. I will continue to fight for electricity to be available to all our citizens. I will continue to fight for an efficient and affordable public transport system for all our people. I will continue to fight for jobs to be created through productive partnerships. You have trusted me with your mandate, and I will never, never let you down. I know your pains, because I have been there. Look beyond the hardship you have endured. See a new beginning; a new direction; a new spirit. Nigerians, I want you to start to dream again. What you see in your dreams, we can achieve together,”
What did he deliver?
For the first time in 25 years, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) under the administration of Jonathan rebased the nation’s economy leaving it the largest in Africa. The rebased Gross Domestic Product (GDP) saw estimates for 2013 hitting $509.9billion. The significance lies in what the NBS said: “Before the current rebasing project, Nigeria had not rebased since 1990, whereas the UN Statistical Commission recommends the exercise be carried out every 5 years.” According to the Chief Economist of the World Bank for Africa, Francisco Ferreira, the rebasing has “exposed Nigeria’s investment potential to the world. “Prior to the rebasing exercise, nobody knew that Nigerian economy was as big as it turned out to be.”
A pro-Jonathan group, Build Up Nigeria listed some achievements of the President as follows: signing into law the Nigerian Oil and Gas Industry Content Development Bill 2010 (Local Content Bill) which has increased local content in the oil and gas sector. As a direct result of that law Royal Dutch Shell awarded a N7.8 billion ($49.9 million) contract to a Nigerian firm, S.C.C Limited, for the manufacturing of high pressure line pipes that would otherwise have been awarded to a foreign firm. Exxon Mobil also awarded an off shore platform contract to a local firm, Nigerdock Nig. Plc that would otherwise have been awarded to a foreign firm.
Other achievements are the establishment of a Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) with a seed capital of $1 billion and the creation of three sub funds- the Nigeria Infrastructure Fund; the Future Generations Fund and the Stabilization Fund which will be the pillars of the SWF; reduction of food imports by over 40% as of 2013, moving the country closer to self sufficiency in agriculture; and launching of the Youth Enterprise with innovation in Nigeria (YOUWIN) initiative on the 11th October 2011 which is the administration’s job creation centre piece. On Thursday April 12, 2012, 1,200 Nigerian youths emerged winners of the competition following a transparent process. Each winner receives a business start up grant of between N1million to N10 million.
Grim realities of the economy
Contrary to Jonathan’s pledged to the nation, the economy is actually in the reverse gear to the extent that a former Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Prof. Charles Chukwuma Soludo gave the administration an ‘F’ rating. He said: “Everywhere else in the world, government performance on the economy is measured by some outcome variables such as: income (GDP growth rate), stability of prices (inflation and exchange rate), unemployment rate, poverty rate, etc. On all these scores, this government has performed worse than its immediate predecessor – Obasanjo regime. If we appropriately adjust for oil income and debt, then this government is the worst in our history on the economy.”
On his part, ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, who spoke at a book launch in honour of a former President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Mustapha Akanbi, said: “What the public know or see of the economy is not what the economy truly is.
“The economy is in the doldrums, if not in reverse. The often-quoted GDP (gross domestic product) growth neither reflects on the living condition of most of our people, nor on most of the indigenous industries and services where capacity utilization is almost 50 per cent.” The indices for the acclaimed transformation of the nation’s economy are not adding up.
While struggling to rubbish the observations of Obasanjo and Soludo, the government also tactically came up with austerity measures as oil prices crashed. It was a tacit admission that all was not well.
According to a research by the International Press Centre (IPC), Jonathan made 91 promises to Nigerians in 2011 which remain largely unfulfilled. Some of the broken promises are: delivering stable, constant supply of electricity; providing stable power supply by the year 2015 so that small and medium scale industries can thrive again; ensuring that Nigerians do not use generators more than two times in a week; exploring the coal deposits in Benue and Kogi states for improved power supply; construction of more dams to build more hydro-power stations.; reduction of importation of generators at least 90 percent in the next four years.
Electricity supply
The worst hit is the power sector which Jonathan in his inaugural speech promised to address. Although the power sector was privatized in 2014, Nigerians have not felt the effect because outage still persists to the extent of paralyzing economic activities nationwide. Most small and medium enterprises are folding up because of outages.
In fact, government ministries and parastatals now spend a huge chunk of their recurrent budget on diesel for alternative source of electricity. The new darling of Aso Rock, Governor Ayodele Fayose captured the situation better on December 21, 2014 when he said: “One can imagine the hardship small business owners go through, people running businesses such as barbing salons, welding outfits among others. A large chunk of what could have been their profit is spent on purchasing and fueling generators. The health hazards of generator smoke are also there.”
At the inception of his government, the power generation in 2011 was 2,800mw but Jonathan said he would increase it to about 4,747 megawatts by December 2011. Four years down the line, the generation as at 2015 is now 3, 479.55mw out of which 3,406 megawatts is transmitted to Nigerians. Since the President disclosed that his administration had so far spent $8.26billion on the National Integrated Power Projects (NIPP), he has been able to increase electricity generation by 679.55megawatts in four years with such heavy investment. This is outside the fact that the government of ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo expended about $10billion to $13.278billion on power projects between 1999 and 2007.
The unemployment crisis
Going by facts and figures from the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, about 1.8m young Nigerians enter into the nation’s labour market yearly. This means, in the last four years about 7.2m unemployed have joined the saturated market.
By its records, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) said the economy created about 1.2 million jobs in 2013 fiscal year. On the other years, the NBS simply left the public guessing with its verdict: “Unemployment Rate in Nigeria increased to 23.90 percent in 2011 from 21.10 percent in 2010. Unemployment rate in Nigeria averaged 14.60 percent from 2006 until 2011, reaching an all time high of 23.90 percent in 2011 and a record low of 5.30 Percent in 2006.” But a CBN official said about 70 per cent of 80million youths in the country are either unemployed or underemployed. The Special Assistant on Sustainable Banking, CBN, Dr. Aisha Mahmood, said unemployment remains a severe threat to Nigeria’s economy. She made the disclosure in a paper on Nigerian Sustainable Banking Principle during the 2014 World Environment Day programme organized by the Federal Ministry of Environment in Abuja. “As the population is growing, the resources that we all depend on, the food, energy, water, is declining,” she said. “The demand for these resources will rise exponentially by the year 2030, with the world needing about 50 per cent more food, 45 per cent more energy and 30 per cent more water.
“In Nigeria, there is the issue of youth and employment. 70 per cent of the 80 million youths in Nigeria are either unemployed or underemployed. We are all witness to what happened recently during the immigration recruitment exercise and this is simply because 80 per cent of the Nigerian youth are unemployed”.
In its Economic Report on Nigeria released in May 2013, the World Bank noted that “Nigeria’s annual growth rates that average over seven per cent in official data during the last decade place the nation among the fastest growing economies in the world. The growth has been concentrated particularly on trade and agriculture, which would suggest substantial welfare benefits for many Nigerians. Nevertheless, poverty reduction and job creation have not kept pace with population growth, implying social distress for an increasing number of Nigerians. Progress towards the fulfillment of many of the Millennium Development Goals has been slow, and the country ranked 153 out of 186 countries in the 2013 United Nations Human Development Index.
“Job creation in Nigeria has been inadequate to keep pace with the expanding working age population. The official unemployment rate had steadily increased from 12 per cent of the working age population in 2006 to 24 per cent in 2011. Preliminary indications are that this upward trend continued in 2012.”
Also in June 2013, the Honorary International Investors Council (HIIC), inaugurated in 2004 as a presidential advisory body to attract global financial players into the Nigerian economy expressed concern about “the growing unemployment rate and the rising number of poor skilled workforce” in Nigeria.
The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, once said she was losing sleep over the high unemployment rate nationwide. She said: “Each year, about 1.8m young Nigerians enter into our labour market and we need to ensure that the economy provides jobs for them.
“When you look at Nigeria, for over 50 to 60 years, we’ve been working without the key institutions that some other people have. We keep making stopgap solutions. For 50 years, we didn’t have a Bureau for Public Procurement; for 50 years, we didn’t have a Debt Management Office. So many of the institutions that we have now are new and if you stand back, you’ll see there are still many gaps. It is now our job to try to fill those gaps.”
Depletion of foreign reserves
Nigeria’s foreign exchange reserves fell to $34.51 billion by January 13, down 20.2 percent from $43.24 billion a year earlier, owing to draw downs by the Central Bank to defend the naira. Data from the bank showed that Nigeria’s reserves have steadily declined, falling 3.2 percent month-on-month.
Addressing journalists at the end of the monthly Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) meeting in Abuja (24th February 2015), the Minister of State for Finance, Ambassador Bashir Yuguda said the nation suffered substantial loss of revenue due to drop in crude oil prices as well as a 33 per cent decrease in export volume between November and December, 2014 which translated to a loss of $159.88 million. He said: “The shut down and shut-in of trunks and pipe lines at various terminals continued to impact negatively on the revenue performance.
“Non-oil revenues performed below the 2014 budgetary provisions. Yuguda linked the fall in non-oil revenues to fall in the price of crude oil in the international market which he said other revenues are tied to. This financial loss he said has resulted in the continued shrinkage of available funds shared by the three tiers of government so much so that the three tiers shared N500.130 billion for the month of January 2015 from the Federation Account. The minister of state for finance disclosed that $2 billion was left in the Excess Crude Account with an additional N19 billion residing in the Domestic Excess Crude Account.
Soludo, however, faulted the excuse given by the Federal Government for the decline in foreign reserves. He said: “For comparisons, President Obasanjo met about $5 billion in foreign reserves, and the average monthly oil price for the 72 months he was in office was $38, and yet he left $43 billion in foreign reserves after paying $12 billion to write-off Nigeria’s external debt. In the last five years, the average monthly oil price has been over $100, and the quantity also higher but our foreign reserves have been declining and exchange rate depreciating.
“My calculation is that if the economy was better managed, our foreign reserves should have been between $102 -$118 billion and exchange rate around N112 before the fall in oil prices. As of now, the reserves should be around $90 billion and exchange rate no higher than N125 per dollar.”
Agriculture
This is a controversial sector where the Jonathan administration prides itself as having achieved much. Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, says it succeeded in smashing fertilizer syndicates in the country. Hitherto, fertilizer meant for peasant farmers was exported by a cabal which had hijacked the system for a decade and a half. The fertilizer was being distributed to only 11 per cent of the farmers. But it is claimed that within 90 days in office, the corruption in the fertilizer chain was cleaned up.
The government also introduced ‘Cassava Revolution’ which led to an output of over 45 million metric tonnes in 2014 according to the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Following cooperation with the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA), the government developed 40 per cent substitution of Cassava flour for wheat flour. The government has also received support from
international institutions like World Bank ($500m); IFAD ($80m) and $500,000 grant; African Development Bank ($250m); Ford Foundation ($750,000) and DFID 130,000 pounds.
A former Minister of Agriculture under ex-President Obasanjo, Alhaji Adamu Bello has, however, described the so-called achievements as paper work. He said all the facts and figures from Adesina could not be verified from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
He said the “performance of the sector in terms of GDP growth had been on a steady decline since former Obasanjo left office in 2007. He said the data from the NBS said the last time a growth rate was recorded in the sector was in 2007 with 7.20 per cent.
Between 2008 and 2011, the growth rate was 6.30 per cent, 5.90, 5.60 and 5.60. In 2012 and 2013, even though a target of 8 per cent was set, the growth rate was 3.97 and 4.50 per cent growth.
Bello said: “I have noticed that the achievements being mentioned at various fora, especially by the Senior Special Assistant (SSA) to the President on Public Affairs, Dr. Doyin Okupe, have no basis except that they were stated by the Minister in charge of Agriculture, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina.
“I have personally spoken with the SSA as to his source and he told me that he got all he said from the minister. I reminded him that there are independent government agencies especially the National Bureau of Statistics that he should check with, and he promised to take up the issue with the minister and revert back to me.”
He described the saving of N870billion on fertilizer subsidy as a “figment of imagination” of the Jonathan administration. Bello added: “It is only God the Almighty that will judge the unfair way past administrations are being portrayed. To claim that there was subsidy of N870 billion spent on fertilizers since the use of fertilizers was initially encouraged by the government about 40 years ago is most unfair, as I doubt if the entire agricultural budgets for the whole period was up to that sum.
“For a fact, from 1999-2007, the total subsidy on fertilizers was under N25 billion. This can be verified from the Budget Office of the Federal Ministry of Finance. However, according to Dr. Adesina, the subsidy, which was abused and corruptly taken was claimed to be N26 billion annually over a period of 40 years.”
Inflated food prices
Notwithstanding self-glorification in the Agriculture sector, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) admitted that inflation has led to increase prices of food and consumables in January. It said: “In January, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) which measures inflation rose by 8.2 per cent (year-on-year) 0.2 percentage points from 8.0 per cent recorded in December… Food prices increased at the same pace in January as recorded in December at 9.2 per cent. Most groups that contribute to the food sub-index increased at a faster pace during the month.
“Prices increased at a faster pace in most major non-food divisions such as housing, water, electricity, gas and other fuels; furnishings and household equipment, maintenance and clothing and footwear divisions.”
Tales of waste and corruption in the oil sector
In the last one week, Nigerians were forced to go back to the agonizing era of fuel queues as a result of mismanagement of the oil sector, especially payment of fuel subsidy. In 2012, a N382billion fuel subsidy fraud was uncovered by the Presidential Committee on Verification and Reconciliation of Fuel Subsidy Payments, which was headed by the former Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Access Bank Plc, Mr. Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede.
The discovery followed nationwide protests over fuel price increases initiated by government in a bid to remove the subsidy. The crisis forced the government to introduce a Subsidy Reinvestment Programme (SURE-P) to intervene in critical infrastructure. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has so far recovered about N5billion from persons and organizations indicted in the fuel subsidy scam. The number of 121 suspects, including companies, on trial in connection with fuel subsidy scandal and oil theft in the Niger Delta kept on thinning by the day. Yet the government could not pay N185billion debts owed petroleum marketers until they refused to lift products. The tardiness, occasioned by bureaucratic delay in payment by the Ministry of Finance, had been caught up by the recent devaluation of the Naira and oil marketers are to get N30billion ‘compensation’ for the losses recorded.
Prior to the latest drama over fuel queues, a former Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi (now the Emir of Kano) had in a letter to President Jonathan blown the lid on non-remittance of $49.8billion out of $67billion realized from total crude oil lifting from January 2012 to July 2013.
After investigation by the Senate Committee on Finance, it discovered that $20billion was yet to be accounted for by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and those managing the oil sector. In its report, PwC said the gross revenue from crude oil lifting was $69.34bn between January 2012 and July 2013 and not $67bn as earlier stated by the Senate Reconciliation Committee, what was remitted to the Federation Account was $50.81bn and not $47bn. At the end of a Forensic Audit Report, NNPC and the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) were asked to refund $1.48billion but those responsible for the sleaze were spared the rod. Whatever is the figure the state is trying to protect, Sanusi was vindicated that the system in NNPC is untidy.
A leader who should know better, ex-President Obasanjo said: “We had not adequately prepared for the rainy days in the management of proceeds from oil and gas resources. With crude oil purchase by the U.S. from Nigeria going down by some 30 per cent in the last three years as a result of shale oil revolution, things are not looking up in the oil and gas sector, and hence, in the economy.”
Another former CBN Governor, Soludo, in a response to the Minister of Finance, said N30trillion might have been “stolen or lost or unaccounted for or simply mismanaged under your watchful eyes in the past four years.”
In his letter to Okonjo-Iweala he said: “I was really embarrassed to read that one of the reasons for declining forex reserves is ‘oil theft’. Under you as Minister of Finance and coordinator of the economy, the basket of our national treasury is leaking profusely from all sides. Just a few illustrations! First, you admit that ‘oil theft’ has reduced oil output from the average 2.3 – 2.4 million barrels per day (mpd) to 1.95mpd (meaning that at least 350,000 to 450,000 barrels per day are being ‘stolen’.
“On the average of 400,000 per day and the oil prices over the past four years, it comes to about $60 billion ‘stolen’ in just four years. In today’s exchange rate, that is about N12.6 trillion. This is at a time of cessation of crisis in the Niger Delta and amnesty programme. Can you tell Nigerians how much the amnesty programme costs, and also the annual cost for ‘protecting’ the pipelines and security of oil wells? And the ‘thieves’ are spirits? Come on, Madam!
Second, my earlier article stated that the minimum forex reserves should have been at least $90 billion by now and you did not challenge it. Rather it is about $30 billion, meaning that gross mismanagement has denied the country some $60 billion or another N12.6 trillion.
“Now add the ‘missing’ $20 billion from the NNPC. You promised a forensic audit report ‘soon’, and more than a year later the Report itself is still ‘missing’.
“This is over N4 trillion, and we don’t know how much more has ‘missed’ since Sanusi cried out. How many trillions of naira was paid for oil subsidy (un-appropriated?). How many trillions (in actual fact) have been ‘lost’ through customs duty waivers over the last four years? As coordinator of the economy, can you tell Nigerians why the price of automotive gas oil (AGO), popularly called diesel, has still not come down despite the crash in global crude oil prices, and how much is being appropriated by friends in the process?
“Be honest: do you really know (as coordinator and minister of finance) how many trillions of Naira, self- financing government agencies earn and spend? I have a long list but let me wait for now. I do not want to talk about other ‘black pots’ that impinge on national security.
“My estimate, Madam, is that probably more than N30 trillion has either been stolen or lost or unaccounted for or simply mismanaged under your watchful eyes in the past four years. Since you claim to be in charge, Nigerians are right to ask you to account. Think about what this amount could mean for the 112 million poor Nigerians or for our schools, hospitals, roads, etc. Soon, you will start asking the citizens to pay this or that tax, while some faceless “thieves” were pocketing over $40 million per day from oil alone.”
“The very people government exists to regulate have seized the levers of government as policymakers and most government institutions have largely been ‘privatized’ to them. Mention any major government department or agency and someone will tell you whom it has been ‘allocated’ to, and the person subsequently nominates his minion to occupy the seat,” he said.
Mr. Soludo said while Nigeria has for years enjoyed oil boom and increasing budget, poverty and unemployment reached unprecedented levels under President Jonathan.
“This is the only government in our history where rapidly increasing government expenditure was associated with increasing poverty. The director general of NBS (National Bureau of Statistics) stated in his written press conference address in 2011 that about 112 million Nigerians were living in poverty. Is this the record to defend?” he said.
“For example, currently in Nigeria, it is estimated that more than 60 per cent of graduates of our educational system are unemployable. You can understand why many of us are amused when the government celebrates that it has established twelve more glorified secondary schools as universities. I thought they would have told us how many Nigerian universities made it in the league of the best 200 universities in the world. That would have been an achievement.”
Devaluation and corruption
The high-level of corruption in government had created a wedge between the President and some of his benefactors, especially ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo. This has manifested in granting state pardon to well-known looters of the treasury; legal soft-landing for economic crimes suspects; concession of strategic posts in the economy to friends or acquaintances who in turn install their cronies; lack of transparency in privatization of firms; outright graft/ stealing in government as the case with Pension Scam; weakness in rising to any corruption challenge in a ministry or parastatal etc.
Soludo painted the scenario thus: “The very people government exists to regulate have seized the levers of government as policymakers and most government institutions have largely been ‘privatized’ to them. Mention any major government department or agency and someone will tell you whom it has been ‘allocated’ to, and the person subsequently nominates his minion to occupy the seat.
“This is the only government in our history where rapidly increasing government expenditure was associated with increasing poverty. The director general of NBS (National Bureau of Statistics) stated in his written press conference address in 2011 that about 112 million Nigerians were living in poverty. Is this the record to defend?” he said.
“For example, currently in Nigeria, it is estimated that more than 60 per cent of graduates of our educational system are unemployable. You can understand why many of us are amused when the government celebrates that it has established twelve more glorified secondary schools as universities. I thought they would have told us how many Nigerian universities made it in the league of the best 200 universities in the world. That would have been an achievement.”
The devaluation of the naira has created fresh distortions in the economy. From officially exchanging at N168 to a dollar less than three months agos, it is now about N215 to N220 to a dollar. Most Nigerians believe that a tighter fiscal regime would have been better than devaluation.
Reports by a national daily indicate that about $25billion (N4.95trillion) in foreign investments had been lost in the last few months. More job losses are likely because industries depending on imported resources or materials have to pay higher foreign exchange.
Ex-President Obasanjo said devaluation will hurt the poor. He said: “Sooner or later, the naira will have to be drastically devalued without any advantage to our one commodity economy but with horrendous disadvantage to already impoverished Nigerians.
“We will all sink deeper in poverty except for those who have corruptly stashed money abroad and who will start to bring such illegal and illegitimate funds back home to harvest more naira. All the economic gains of recent years and the rebuilding of the middle class may be lost.
“The political will, the discipline, the ability to take the hard measures to reverse the trend will appear not to be there at the leadership level, if the understanding is not there.
“In the end, more businesses will close down, businessmen and women, entrepreneurs and investors will incur more debts. Foreign investors may temporarily stop investing in a downturn economy.
“Because of the naira depreciation, workers, particularly in the public sector, will ask for pay increase which may be justified but will sink us deeper in the swamp.
“The scenario which may sound alarmist is hard to imagine but the signs are there and it would appear that those who should act are dancing slow foxtrot while their trousers are catching fire.”
Will Jonathan enjoy luck till the end?
Deep in his mind, Jonathan is aware that the economic omen is bad but he is looking for a second term ticket to try his ‘luck’ to salvage the situation. Yet, he does not have the political will and a strong economic team to carry out such miracles.
With the presidential election 20 days away, the President is enjoying the rare luck that Nigeria is a nation where citizens pay more attention to hate, religious and ethnic sentiment than matters of economic policy. Or else, his fate would have been sealed by now.
But even if he manages to conjure a short term solution to the fuel supply crisis before poll time, it might not be enough to prevent a tortuous and lonely trip home to Otuoke as the inherent contradictions in the economy take their toll of longsuffering citizens.
