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  • Re-presenting the Under-represented: Toward A Recovery of the American Dream in Higher Education

    Re-presenting the Under-represented: Toward A Recovery of the American Dream in Higher Education

    Utopia Postponed

    Chairman, dignitaries spiritual and temporal, distinguished audience, I want to begin by thanking the organisers of this forum for a timely and wonderful idea, an idea which is in keeping with the finest tradition of the Catholic Church and this remarkable institution of higher learning. As Shakespeare has noted, great reckonings always begin in small rooms, and I am sure that when viewed retrospectively, the deliberations of this forum will be seen as a remarkable and worthy intervention in the educational process of the United States.

    Let me assure the organisers and sponsors that whenever and wherever human history is recorded, there is always a special status and pride of place accorded to the nobility of those who seek a voice for the voiceless and give a helping hand to the helpless.The Roman Catholic establishment is very much part of this noble tradition, and the founding sisters of this university are illustrious exemplars.

    We can even go back in history to the example of Jesus Christ whose radical humanism often led him to a risky identification with the poor, the meek and the wretched of the earth. I say all this not to flatter or to cajole but to place before you the incontrovertible facts of history. In the course of this address, I will show how certain historic personages of the Catholic Church, from Bartolome de Las Casas, the seventeenth century catholic archbishop of Chiapas, to the Abbe Henri-Baptiste Gregoire, a leading French abolitionist of the early eighteenth century, played crucial roles in re-presenting the misrepresented.

    The phenomenon of under- representation is one of the crucial challenges of our time. At the level of contemporary global politics, it has bred wholesale alienation of national communities, alternative cultures and even civilisations. It has ruptured the old international order and it threatens the very paradigm of the nation-state.

    On the other hand, it has spawned in the alienated several desperate measures which range from a strategy of excluding the excluders to what has been described as the logic of perverse connection which invariably means a resort to international crime in order to connect to the grid of the global economy. This often involves deploying the technology of globalisation to achieve ideological ends widely at variance with the goals of an American empire in denial.

    I have put things in this global perspective in order to secure a broader canvas. What concerns us at this forum is not under-representation at the level of global politics, but under-representation at a national and even more fundamental level of human endeavour. We are talking of under-representation in higher education in the United States. It is indeed a supreme irony of history and the human condition that a nation founded on the ideals of freedom and equality, and on the ruins of the feudal injustices of the old world should find its own system of higher education riddled with gross inequities.

    Despite affirmative actions and other ameliorative steps, and despite the struggle and efforts of the civil rights groups and other concerned agencies, the cruel reality of under-representation in the American higher educational system stares us in the face in all its vertical and horizontal dimensions. And this is not just an academic exercise. The symptoms of this national malaise are as clear as they are threatening: cynical distrust of government and political institutions, alienation, social dislocations of biblical proportions, and a progressive loss of faith in the American dream.

    This is what has brought us here today. My address is predicated on the fundamental premise that certain philosophical and ideological correctives are imperative before effective political actions. Without such a foundation, all actions, however heroic and spectacular, are ultimately futile and an invitation to anarchy. In the words of a famous Nigerian novelist, we must go back to where the rains started beating us. As intellectuals, our principal responsibility is to think and illuminate the path of mankind. Before mounting the political barricades we must first remove the philosophical barriers. As Hegel has noted, if reality is inconceivable then we must forge concepts that are inconceivable.

    My address is structured around the major trope of re-presentation. My argument is that before under-representation came misrepresentation and before full representation there must come a re-presentation. In other words, we must first decode and properly understand the hegemonic strategies by which wholesale communities, races, groups are first “othered”, and then compelled to come to terms with their disadvantage as if it is a naturally ordained phenomenon.

    If one were to take a long view of history, it is possible to see this insidious manipulation of military and economic advantages for the purpose of political and intellectual subjugation as a trans-historical phenomenon which is certainly not without its utopian impulses. The anguished cries of Shylock, Shakespeare’s embattled Jewish merchant of Venice, as he tried to reassert his humanity in the face of widespread denial, comes to mind as a grim and timely reminder of the fate of stigmatised minorities however rich and powerful.

    At certain points in history, a people or a society, consciously and unconsciously, often invest themselves with the divine mantra of the bearer of a new telos whose historic destiny is to lift the rest of humanity, often by the bootstraps, to a higher level of civilisation. Yet the immense human suffering often engendered, the world-historic agonies, the cruel and merciless rationalism unleashed on innocent populace are simply staggering and often grossly disproportionate to the eventual benefits to mankind.

    In the event, it compounds and complicates the quest for an ideal society and the redemption of humankind. The question begging for an answer is this: How did the United States of America which was supposed to represent a new beginning for mankind, away from the inequities and iniquities of the old world, come to be haunted by this ancestral sin?

     

    In the Beginning

    In 1809, more than half a century before the outbreak of the American civil war, the Abbe Henri-Baptiste Gregoire, sent a manuscript of a new work to Thomas Jefferson, a founding father and the third president of the United States. The book was a celebration and commemoration of essayists, writers and scientists of African extraction who had found their way to the west. It was titled, De La Litterature des Negress. Despite his principled opposition to slavery, Jefferson’s view of the intellectual capacities of black people was notoriously truculent and characterised by savage dismissals.

    In an infamous passage from his Notes on the State of Virginia, Jefferson noted thus of the African American: “It appears to me that in memory they are equal to whites: in reason much inferior, as I think one could scarcely be found capable of tracing and comprehending the investigations of Euclid; and that in imagination they are dull, tasteless, and anomalous”.

    This remarkable diatribe was coming on the heels of the literary exploits  of the trio Equaino, Cuguano and Sancho, former slaves of African descent, who seized late eighteenth century literary London by the scruff of the neck and were feted in all the leading saloons of England’s capital for their astounding feats of imagination. Being very well-connected to the metropolitan circuits of the old world, Jefferson could not have been unaware of the literary triumphs of these exemplars. Perhaps it was a case of prejudice compounded by deliberate ignorance. Gregoire’s treatise could have been a well-aimed and profoundly clandestine attempt to help Jefferson modify or moderate his unhelpful worldview.

    But it was an uphill task. The same views resonate in the works of European intellectuals and philosophers such as David Hume, Emmanuel Kant, Friedrich Hegel and even Karl Marx. As far as Marx was concerned, India and the African continent lost nothing in the wanton destruction of their old culture by the European conquerors as it was a culture shot through with idiotic superstitions and morbid myths.

    As late as the late twentieth century, the celebrated historian, Hugh Trevor Roper, would dismiss African history as characterised by a dark void in one long night of savagery. And as the early nineteen fifties in post-bellum Atlanta, a grand lady of a house would be so shocked by the discovery that a moonlighting African American houseboy could read that she would exclaim: “Vernon can read!!!” This later became the title of the autobiography of the “boy” in question, Vernon Jordan, corporate lawyer and golf course crony of William Jefferson Clinton.

    This rather inauspicious beginning marked the insertion of African Americans into the educational system of their new country and has ever since determined its less than glorious trajectory. Not only were black people regarded as unlettered savages, the very idea of educating them was forbidden and criminalised. Specific laws were enacted making it a criminal offence to enrol them in schools. The situation was later to create its own macabre absurdities. Several African Americans who triumphed over this legal adversity by sheer fortitude and indomitable will were later to find themselves confronted by an impossible situation.

    On a book signing tour, Fredrick Douglass, the former slave, was advised by his Abolitionist sponsors not to sound too posh and educated lest people began to doubt the veracity of his story. An infamous review of a slave memoir in The Christian Examiner of 1839 opens with the immortal put-down: “We read, in what professes to be the language of a slave, that which we feel a slave could not have written…” Not only must the minority subalterns not speak, they must also not write. And thus was sown the seeds of contemporary under-representation of African Americans in higher education in the United States.

    From the other end of the spectrum, the story is no less appalling and sordid. Fifty years after the conquest of the Inca civilisation by the Spanish conquistadors, the genocide of the Amerindians was so cruel and compelling that Bartolome de Las Casas, the Bishop of Chiapas, and himself a Spaniard, was moved to protest. The local populace was treated worse than the animals of the conquerors. According to a moving account: “The majority of the Spanish military, administrators, and colonists, hungry for gold and power, saw the occupants of the new world as irrevocably Other, less than human, or at least naturally subordinate to Europeans. In a blistering philippic, La Casas notes: “The nature of men is the same and all are called by Christ in the same way”.

    For those interested in history as a museum of atrocities and of man’s inhumanity to man, we can move to nineteenth century Congo and the brutal and systematic elimination of the local populace by King Leopold of Belgium. Two centuries earlier in the same area, the Portuguese had completely decimated the proud people of the Kongo kingdom and carried off virtually the entire populace to the new colony of Brazil through the slave port of Luanda, the capital of present day Angola. When the Portuguese arrived fifty years earlier, they had met a social structure and political administration vastly superior to the one they had left behind at home. But it was an administration without military firepower, and the people paid very dearly for this historic remission.

    But what goes around must come around, and the whirligig of time often brings its own revenge. In the third decade of the nineteenth century, Mexico, with its native Indian populace and overlay of the old conquistador class, finally came within the rifle sights of the triumphant and relentlessly expanding new nation. Having succumbed to a dissolute and corrupt military oligarchy, Mexico presented a classic case of political disorder and social turmoil.

    The philosophical launch pad which facilitated the military subjugation of the Mexicans was known as the doctrine of manifest destiny which held that it was the God-ordained destiny of the United States to bring civilisation, economic prosperity and good governance to the rest of the continent and possibly beyond. This was the stirring of empire, and although this strain of messianic covenant as God’s chosen people has always been present in America, it was in 1845 that John O’Sullivan gave it an authoritative seal in an influential article for The Democratic Review.

    Up till today, many Mexicans regard Los Yanquis with suspicion and sullen resentment. But with the conquest of Mexico and forcible acquisition of a large swathe of its territory, the United States became host-and hostage- to three major minority groups: native American Indians, African Americans and Hispanic Americans. It is no wonder, then, that these groups represent the most under-represented groups in higher education in America. When it has been persistently and consistently drummed into your ears and drilled into your head that you belong to an inferior race and that you are naturally sub-human, it is very hard to rise above the history stupor and the morass of self-pity.

    Naturally enough, you begin to evolve strategies of containment or stratagems of accommodation to a hostile reality of modern enslavement. This is where misrepresentation leads to under representation and structural exclusion induces self-exclusion. In such circumstances, the very notion of an American dream becomes a tall order, an ideological sweetener for the bitter reality of injustice and inequity. The threat of this disequilibrium of opportunity to racial and social harmony in the United States can be better imagined.

     

    Recovery and Re-Presentation of the Subject:

    What the above historical excursion has shown is a drama of misperception and wilful misrepresentation played out across history, across time and across different societies. What we can learn from this is that there are no naturally inferior people, races or societies. This is merely an ideological stigmatization designed to maximize temporary historical advantages and justify economic belligerence. No society is exempt from this. By the same token, history does not confer any special status on any people or society.

    In the interplay of opportunities and unique circumstances, the relay baton for human advancement, as we have seen, often shifts. As it emerged from the long night of the dark ages, the “modern” west has had to define itself and construct its identity not only in total opposition to and exclusion of all that had come before, but also against an inter-lapping barbarous other. This is merely one of the founding myths of modernity as it wilfully ignores the crucial contributions of non-western societies, particularly the Muslim and African worlds, to the very notion of modernity.

    Identity, then, is a function of difference. But while to differentiate is normal and in order, to discriminate on the basis of difference is not and is profoundly subversive of the very basis of our common humanity. The struggle for a just representation in higher education in America must proceed with this re-affirmation of our mutual humanity and the common ancestry of humankind. But while the struggle for political justice and equity proceeds apace, the under-represented, rather than succumbing to self-pity or reconciling themselves to the status of second-class citizens, must also gird their loins to make a positive intervention on the education stage both collectively and individually.

    For groups long suppressed and repressed, long ideologically conditioned to seeing themselves as naturally disadvantaged, this may be a tall order indeed. But it is a banal truism that heavens help those who help themselves. And one is very pleased to note that integration of minority groups into the mainstream of higher education in the United States are already evident in many of the thoughtful proposals for this forum. From the redemptive spirit in African American sports, the need for blacks and other minorities to utilize available educational support in USA, computer literacy training for older adults, to pedagogical alternatives for the marginalized and the growing need for on-line higher education. These are all immense resources for a journey of hope and redemption, and the recovery of the American dream in higher education.

    Indeed as history has shown, the great ideas for moving a society forward do not come from hegemonic groups that are happy with the status quo but from the ranks of the marginalized and excluded. These momentous insights are often wrenched at great personal costs and immense suffering. We recall Sigmund Freud writing with what he himself has modestly described as a “a modicum of misery”.

    We recall Antonio Gramsci, a consumptive hunchback, being thrown into jail with the war-cry: “We must prevent this brain from functioning for twenty years”. Unfortunately for Mussolini, it was precisely in prison that Gramsci wrote his best work. And we must remember the example of Franz Kafka, wracked by consumption and tuberculosis, a victim of multiple displacement, who nevertheless went ahead to create some of the most haunting allegories of the human condition.

    Let me caution, however, that while we struggle for political justices and equity and we deploy all available intellectual resources in the quest for the full representation of all marginalised groups in higher education in the United States, we must not allow hatred to dwell in our heart. For this is ultimately self-defeating. We return then to the good Bishop of Chiapas, Bartholome de Las Casas , who reminded the conquistadors that humankind is one.

    If this is turned on its head, we discover that we are all guilty of marginalizing and oppressing the other. From the phenomenon of Mfecane or dispersal visited on South African nationalities by Chaka, the late Zulu conqueror, the reality of Arab slavery in Black Africa even at this moment, the colonial ravages and despoliation in the old and new world, to the current decimations of globalization, there is no record of human advancement which is not at the same time a record of barbarity—to paraphrase Adorno. And as Albert Camus has observed, “There is a solidarity of human-beings in aberration”.

    But while we regret the dark spots of history with all their trauma and pains, let us also remember the bright moments. In the United States. let us recall the examples of great and good Americans like George Washington who declined to reign as the sovereign monarch of his beloved country and chose to be ruled as an equal citizen; Abraham Lincoln who sought a just human solution to societal conflicts; and of course the man we all honour this month, Dr Martin Luther King, who had a dream of an America rid of social segregation and under-representation and was happy to lay down his life in the pursuit of that ideal.

    When we recall the strivings of these great icons of social and political justice, even as we add our own modest contributions at this forum, we can come to the conclusion that the utopia represented by the United States and incarnated in the American dream has merely been deferred. My task is done. I thank you for the excellent opportunity.

     

    • Keynote speech by Professor Adebayo Williams at the forum: Under-Represented Groups and Education: Challenges for the 21stCentury.

    February 12-13 2004 , J. E. and L. E. Mabee Library, University of the Incarnate Word, San Antonio, Texas.

     

    • Adebayo Williams was the Amy Freeman Lee Distinguished Chair of Humanities and Fine Arts

    University of The Incarnate Word, San Antonio, TX78209

     

  • ‘Neglect of agric ‘ll slow down economic recovery’

    President, Federation of Agriculture Association of Nigeria (FACAN), Dr Victor Iyama, has warned that the economy will continue to decline due to the lack of attention paid to the agriculture sector, which has been the backbone of the economy for decades.

    He said contribution of the agriculture sector is likely to drop further this year as new government failed to deliver on infrastructural  development through budgetary  allocation.

    Iyama who is also Chairman, Board of Trustees, Cocoa Association of Nigeria (CAN),urged the government not to cave-in to the  pressure of increasing state government debts, to reduced budget allocation set aside for improving the farming environment.

    With the drop in oil revenue, he appealed to the government to rethink its plans by ensuring that more public money is spent on measures to protect agriculture and boost  agric exports.

    He stressed that the government needed to go back to the drawing board to ensure that agric strategy finds new ways to ensure farmers provide more food to Nigerians.

    According to him, the issue of delay in salaries payment should not be used as an excuse to divert funds meant for development purposes, as there were sufficient budgetary allocations for salaries.

    He explained that the issue of delay  in salaries payment has falsely been presented urging  the  government to continue meeting all ongoing commitments to agric programmes.

    He said so long as the budget pays less attention to agriculture, the overall national development would continue to be compromised.

    What is even more worrisome, he said, was that the few good policies in various budgets have also not been implemented.

    For example, he said the budget provided for irrigation facilities, but they were never implemented.

    He observed that Nigeria’s economic woes are a reflection of the state of agriculture in the country, which has been characterised by under-investment, application of outmoded technologies, and use of rudimentary agricultural equipment.

    He advocated for a paradigm shift in policy that will oblige financial institutions, particularly banks, to provide a certain percentage of their loan portfolio to agriculture.

    This, according to him, will certainly address the credit deficit that characterised agriculture production in the country.

    He said inadequate budgetary allocations for the sector undermine its capacity to expand and create more jobs, despite the fact that agriculture has the propensity to create more jobs than other sectors.

    According to him, large numbers of unemployed youth have low skills, thereby making them not qualified for high-skilled jobs in the services sector, saying they are best suited for the agriculture sector.

    He added that the quest to reduce poverty significantly is hampered by lack of job opportunities in the agriculture sector and the declining contribution of the sector to the GDP.

    He said for Nigeria to move into total mechanisation of agriculture, the size of farm land was critical because the one or two acre holdings is not economically viable for farmers to make enough profit to cater for themselves and their families. Therefore, farmers must have realistic land sizes to be able to make great gains.

    He noted that though all governments put some premium on agriculture, farmers had no access to viable seeds and the irrigation system in the country had totally collapsed.

     

  • SMEs’ thorny road to recovery

    SMEs’ thorny road to recovery

    Things appear to be looking up for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), despite challenges before the sector credited with the capacity to create jobs, boost production and diversify the economy, writes Assistant Editor CHIKODI OKEREOCHA.

    the Director-General/CEO,Nigerian Youth Chamber of Commerce (NYCC), Comrade Peter Ayim, is upbeat that Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) will soon gather momentum to catalyse industrial growth.

    His optimism is hinged on the recent signing of a service agreement between Bank of Industry (BoI) and Business Development Service Providers (BDSPs) as well as other strategic initiatives aimed at unlocking the opportunities in the sector, globally acknowledged as the engine of growth. This is because of its capacity to create jobs, boost production and diversify the economy.

    BoI had on November 21, last year signed a service agreement with 122 BDSPs. The synergy, seen by industry stakeholders as a revolutionary step in development banking, entailed BDSPs collaborating with the development finance institutions to identify credible SMEs that require funding. They would also develop bankable business plans and proposals for SMEs to facilitate their access to finance. The BDSPs, according to BoI’s Managing Director,  Rasheed Olaoluwa, would also provide post-finance services, such as mentorship, handholding, advice and inculcation of best practices for SMEs, among others.

    A few months after the agreement was consummated, Ayim confirmed to The Nation that the BDSPs have hit the ground running by preparing SME projects for possible financial support by BoI. For instance, NYCC, one of the BDSPs that scaled BoI’s rigorous and painstaking selection process, is engaged with about 10 SMEs.

    “We have been engaging with 10 SMEs. While some came to us on their own, Skye Bank Plc, one of the SME-friendly banks referred some to us. We are talking to the SMEs,” he said.

    Comrade Ayim added that as part of the chamber’s services to its clients, it has also commenced discussions with Raw Material Research and Development Council (RMRDC), to organise a workshop for the SMEs.

    “The service agreement was the missing link,” he said, noting that the signing of the agreement effectively addressed the gap in the areas of poor packaging of loan requests and non-bankable business plans, which are some of the factors responsible for the low level of financial support to SME operators.

    He added that as the umbrella body and voice of youth entrepreneurs, the chamber is proud to be associated with an initiative that is poised to stimulate SMEs. While describing the initiative as an emerging trend, he called on SMEs to take advantage of the window created by BoI to build their capacity to play their role as growth drivers. He said while NYCC and other BDSPs are preparing the enterprise operators by providing them with a range of services, the collaborating banks provide the working capital.

    Chairman Managing Consultant, Resort Consult Limited, a BDSP, Mr. Femi Ekundayo, is no less excited over the prospects of SMEs riding on the platform of the agreement to scale up their operations.

    “It’s a good thing that BoI did”, he said, noting that Resort Consult Limited, a financial consultancy firm specialising in financial advisory service, project and manpower development, is appraising two SME projects before forwarding them to BoI.

    “We are appraising two projects. We expect that by April after the elections the projects would be completed and approved,” he disclosed. Ekundayo, however, said in rendering services to the SME sector, BDSPs are faced with the challenge of the attitude of SME operators, most of who do not want to be persuaded that there is light at the end of the tunnel for them.

    “Despite that a lot of interventions made in the sector brightened prospects for SME operators, it takes a lot of persuasion to make them know that there is light at the end of the tunnel for them,” he said.

    He identified other challenges facing SMEs to include lack of technical capacity to package their feasibility studies and businesses very well; lack of good management structure and accounting system to make them attractive to financial institutions for any form of assistance, as well as harsh economic environment. For instance, most SMEs are weighed down by high operating cost due to lack of basic infrastructure particularly power.

    Perhaps, most importantly, with the economic crisis caused by crashing oil prices and, subsequently, the devaluation of the naira, SMEs who depend on high import with the associated foreign exchange risk are unable to compete in the global market. The current lending rate of between 20 and 30 per cent is also considered unfriendly for SMEs, as most of them find it difficult to sustain their businesses at that level.

     

    SME-friendly banks to the rescue

    The recent signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between BoI and 10 SME-friendly banks set the tone for a major reversal in the fortunes of the sector with regards to project funding. The 10 commercial banks renowned for their SME-centric activities were carefully chosen to partner with BoI in the financing of their SME customers. The banks include Access Bank, Diamond Bank, Ecobank, Fidelity Bank, FirstBank, First City Monument Bank, Skye Bank, Stanbic IBTC Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, and United Bank for Africa.

    Essentially, the banks are collaborating with BoI in the provision of long-term loans to qualified SMEs based on BoI’s Risk Acceptance Criteria (RAC) and the provision of working capital to the SMEs also based on individual bank’s RAC. Olaoluwa explained that the terms of the loans will be in accordance with BoI term loan with a tenor of three to five years. While the moratorium will be 6-12 moths, interest rate is between 9 and 10 per cent per annum. On the other hand, working capital facilities by SME-friendly banks will be on a tenor of 6-12 months.

    The BoI MD listed sectors to be financed to include agro-processing, solid minerals and metals, light manufacturing, logistics, etc. identified under the Nigeria Industrial Revolution Plan (NIRP) launched by the Federal Government recently. While describing the synergy between BoI and the SME-friendly banks as unprecedented, he said it will undoubtedly foster greater access to finance for SMEs, financial inclusion for Nigerians and also engender wealth creation and accelerated job creation for Nigerians.

    Banks have since keyed into this aspiration, having seen the synergy as opening up a new vista for them in that sector of the economy.

     

    CBN shows the way

    The launch of the N220 billion MSMEs’ Development Fund in August 2013 by the CBN was a shot in the arm of MSMEs.

    The intervention, which CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele, described as an innovative way of improving MSMEs access to finance, was aimed at shoring up the sector’s potential for job creation and poverty reduction in the country. One way it hopes to achieve this is by addressing the challenge of high cost of funds that has continued to affect operators’ profitability.

    This is so because most commercial banks charge as high as between 22 and 25 per cent interest rates. Micro-finance Banks (MFBs) even charge higher, insisting on between 30 and 40 per cent interest rates. The exorbitant interest rate charged by the commercial banks is also believed to be partly responsible for why local industries are uncompetitive.

    This was why the CBN in its guidelines said the fund attracts nine per cent interest rate. The fund would also be administered through private or state owned Micro-Finance Institutions (MFIs), Finance Houses, and Cooperative Finance Agencies. Such MFIs or micro-finance banks must pass CBN’s competency and proficiency tests in order to certify them capable of distributing these funds to MSMEs. State governments will be able to access up to N2 billion each for lending to eligible beneficiaries through Participating Financial Institutions (PFIs) in their states.

    In other words, the CBN will not be lending directly to farmers or businesses. What the fund does is a wholesale fund. It provides funding to the PFIs. MFIs or micro-finance banks can also come to the fund. The CBN will assess them; give them the money at low interest rate. The PFIs would undertake that they will lend at low rate of interest to micro-entrepreneurs, the low-income earners, farmers, artisans and the active poor who operate in the informal sector. Also, PFIs can only finance agricultural value chain activities, trade and commerce; cottage industries, artisans, among others.

    The apex bank in a bid to ensure that productive sectors of the economy attract more finance necessary for employment creation and diversification of the country’s economic base, also said a maximum of 10 per cent of the commercial component of the fund should be channeled to trading and commerce.

    The icing on the cake of the intervention for MSMEs perhaps, was the provision that 60 per cent of the fund, representing N132 billion, be earmarked for providing financial services to women-owned businesses. Emefiele said PFIs would be required to submit periodic returns on disbursements as well as an analysis of the social impacts of the fund. He added that the finance sector regulator will also undertake regular on and off site checks to ascertain the veracity of the reports received.

     

    SON, OPS also involved

    Rejection of made in Nigeria goods because of poor quality and packaging remains a pain in the neck of most SME operators. To halt the trend, which inflicts losses to operators and by extension, the local economy, the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) is certifying SMEs in the country to prepare them for export. This is in the hope of stopping the high scrutiny given made-in-Nigeria goods at the global market.

    During a visit by the National President, Nigerian Association of Chamber of Commerce, Industry Mines and Agriculture, Alhaji Mohammed Abubakar to SON in Lagos, its Director-General, Dr. Joseph Odumodu, said the agency found that apart from challenges of funding and poor management facing SMEs, what makes SMEs fit for export is not just for their products to meet Nigerian standards but also meet international standards. “We intend to work with SMEs going forward to build them to international standards,” he said.

    Odumodu stated that as part of the agency’s emphasis on making made in Nigeria products acceptable all over the world, its accredited laboratory is for a specific competence, which boasts of carrying chemical and biological testing for agricultural products in the country. He said Nigeria has entered a phase, which he called the map for world quality due to its latest accredited laboratory.

    While urging SMEs to take advantage of this golden opportunity to push their products to the world, he said SON intends to certify 50 SMEs to International Standard Organisation (ISO) 9001 quality management systems.

    SME operators are not folding their arms. Recently, the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), part of the Organised Private Sector (OPS) commenced a programme of equipping SMEs with requisite skills needed to make their products competitive.

    LCCI President Alhaji Remi Bello, stressed that the Chamber was embarking on the initiative because the sector has been proven by developed economies of the world as a tool to accelerate economic growth and development.

    Bello, who spoke through LCCI Director General, Mr. Muda Yusuf, during the graduation of 25 mentees of the chamber’s mentoring programme scheme 2, said the mentoring programme is aimed at match-making young business leaders with experienced business owners to share their experiences with the mentees in order to make their products competitive anywhere in the world.

     

    More hurdles to cross

    Ordinarily, a combination of these interventions ought to take the SME sector out of the woods. But this has not happened. Although, operators and experts say that there is silver lining on the horizon for SMEs as a result of the increased focus on the sector, they however, contend that there are still a number of hurdles that must be crossed if SMEs must get to the ‘Promised Land’.

    One of such hurdles, according to Mr. Ekundayo, is the lack of technical/financial management capacity by most SMEs. He also said SMEs lack technical capacity and are constrained by harsh economic environment induced by high operating cost due to lack of basic infrastructure, particularly power.

    The poor state of roads also increases the cost of transporting both raw materials and finished goods to and from markets. They are also under constant threats from different organs and tiers of government who collect regressive and multiple taxes and levies.

    Most importantly perhaps, the current economic crisis caused by crashing oil prices and subsequently, devaluation of the naira, is taking a huge toll on SMEs who depend on high import. With the associated foreign exchange risk, most SMEs are unable to compete in the global market place. The current lending rate of between 20 and 30 per cent is considered unfriendly for SMEs, as most of them find it different to sustain their businesses at that level.

    That is not all. The attitude of some SMEs, according to Ekundayo, is not helping matters. He said despite the fact that a lot of interventions made in the sector have brightened prospects for SME operators, “It takes a lot of persuasions to make them know that there is light at the end of the tunnel.”

     

    Recommendations

    Ayim noted that although, Nigeria has the required number of active enterprises, with a predominantly youthful population of over 70 million youths, what is required is for government to give them the needed impetus by deliberately creating the enabling environment that will remove all the barriers that impede youth-led micro enterprises.

    According to him, this could be done by building a robust and dynamic public/private enterprise development eco system. “This will facilitate diverse direct investment options in youth focused start-ups and micro-enterprises,” he told The Nation. While describing government’s diverse intervention programmes as ‘demonstration of commitment to encourage and support the promotion and development of entrepreneurship and the MSME, he said it is also important for government to explore other credible vistas so that more people can enter and actively participate in the MSME sector.

    “In the circumstance, a dynamic mix of micro-leasing, micro-insurance and demand-driven business development services offered within a cluster is a credible option that should be encouraged,” he said, adding that using this approach will enable more aspiring entrepreneurs who cannot meet the conditions of accessing available funding options to access appropriate equipment under a micro-leasing arrangement for their businesses while existing entrepreneurs can access equipment to grow and expand their businesses.

     

    Why SMEs hold the ace

    President Goodluck Jonathan underscored the critical importance of SMEs to Nigeria’s economic growth and development when at the recent inauguration of the MSMEs Council he said: “MSMEs are the innovators, the wealth creators, as well as employment generators. Every MSME today has the potential of growing to the large corporation of tomorrow, and that is why we are now backing the initiative with the creation of this Council.”

    Latest survey by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) put the number of MSMEs in Nigeria at 17.2 million. The enterprises, according to NBS, employ over 32 million people. Citing the survey, Jonathan said, “Over 95 per cent of registered businesses in Nigeria are small businesses. If each of these businesses employs one more person, we would create over 17 million extra jobs, which would indeed be a revolution in Nigeria’s job markets. This is the unexplored power of small businesses.”

    The President also explained how MSMEs’ impact on employment, saying that apart from employing people directly, MSMEs promote employment indirectly through creating market opportunities and improving market conditions. They also disperse and diversify economic activities, wealth creation and distribution as well as localize resources, mobilise savings, and stimulate indigenous entrepreneurship and technology especially in developing economies.

    The job creation capacity of  the sector appears to be the most interesting. For instance, 70 per cent of all new net jobs in the US are created by SMEs, according to National President of Nigerian Association of Small Scale Industrialists (NASSI), the umbrella association for all small scale enterprises and industries in Nigeria, Chief Chuku Wachuku. He however, said that in Nigeria SMEs contribute about 95 per cent to Gross Domestic Product (GDP), but their only problem is that whereas they contribute this percentage to GDP, the wealth addition stands at only 46 per cent.

    He noted that the economy of the emerging nations or even developed nations appreciate that economies must necessarily depend on MSMEs and the informal sector because it’s the engine of growth, propelling the economies of those countries by creating the bulk of job opportunities. He said government only creates the enabling environment for the private sector to thrive through unfettered access to credit facility to MSMEs in those countries as well as provide the necessary infrastructure.

     

     

  • NEITI’s $2bn recovery

    NEITI’s $2bn recovery

    THE Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative’s (NEITI) laudable audit gambit has put it in positive public klieg light. The bold initiative has turned NEITI against, especially the Petroleum Product Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) that has publicly engaged it in a war of words. Yet, the initiative has admirably recovered $2billion into the public till after the implementation of its audit reports.

    NEITI’s track records, according to Zainab Ahmed, its executive secretary, speak volumes: from 1999-2004, its audit of oil and gas establishments led to the recovery of $1 billion; in 2005 it recovered about $515million while it also recovered $447million between 2006-2008. The total recoverable revenue emanating from the NEITI audits reportedly stands at $9.6billion.

    Despite these laudable recoveries, the PPPMC and most oil and gas companies have become uncomfortable with the body. Rather than see the initiative as a challenge to uphold probity and accountability in their establishments, they tend to see it more as an adversary outfit. For instance, the PPPMC has been trying to rubbish its audit report over a recommendation calling the agency to refund into the Federation Account an over-recovery of N4.423billion.

    We do not think that there should be any hullabaloo over this matter if there is no concealed animosity against the initiative’s audit moves that have obviously ruffled feathers in that important sector of the economy. This is aside the fact that NEITI was able to subsequently know that the disputed over-recovery of N4.423billion by the PPPRA was remitted to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) account. Over-recovery applies when the landing cost of products based on import parity principle is below the approved PPPRA ex-depot benchmark. Hence, marketers are required to pay over-recovery into Petroleum Subsidy Fund (PSF) account at the CBN.

    NEITI reportedly demanded during the audit for relevant documents but PPPRA tendered other documents that did not show that the money was remitted. It waited till after the release of the audit report that did not favour it before releasing those documents showing that the money was actually paid to a designated account in the CBN. The implication of this is that the PPPRA deliberately withheld some vital documents, ostensibly to embarrass NEITI. Otherwise, why were documents relating to this over-recovery withheld initially?

    We are not persuaded by Reginald Stanley, PPPRA executive secretary’s claim that the report was not signed off by the agency’s management. How can the agency sign off an audit that, ab initio, it wanted to frustrate? What the report did was to merely query the shortfall between what was paid and what government received and that ought not to have led to any bickering.  The truth is that the PPPRA and other aggrieved oil and gas concerns should take the NEITI audit in good faith.

    We are deeply concerned about the unabated institutional rot and gargantuan thefts that have become routine in the oil sector. The country needs more of such outfits like NEITI to restore reasonable sanity and accountability to the oil and gas industry. The PPPRA outburst is uncalled-for. After all, NEITI had indicted other big oil companies in the past. For example, its audit in 2008 indicted Mobil Oil for owing $83.28 million in Education Tax. But for NEITI’s whistle blowing, the Federal Government would not have so far recovered about $2 billion debt owed it by oil firms operating in the country.

    The battle for financial transparency in the oil sector is in the country’s interest. What NEITI is doing will go a long way in reducing money being lost to private pockets in that important sector.

  • CNPP requests for blanket recovery of $400b Abacha’s loot

    CNPP requests for blanket recovery of $400b Abacha’s loot

    Rising from a meeting in Enugu at the weekend, the Conference of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP) has called for a blanket request for the recovery of Nigeria’s over $400 billion looted funds.

    The CNPP said though it supported the recovery of the funds looted by the late Head of State, Gen. Sani Abacha, the Goodluck Jonathan administration should request for a blanket recovery of over $400 billion fleeced off the nation’s treasury in the last two decades.

    CNPP was reacting to a report by the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr Mohammed Bello Adoke (SAN), that the Federal Government had recovered about N5.5 billion (2.5 million British Pounds) and that negotiation had reached advanced stage to recover N36.7 billion (175 million Euro) of the late Abacha’s looted fund.

    In a communiqué by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr Osita Okechukwu, the CNPPP said: “President Jonathan should utilise the window opened by the United Nations Convention Against Corruption, which binds countries to render mutual legal assistance in gathering and transferring evidence and Chapter V of the Convention, which makes asset recovery explicitly a fundamental principle of the Convention.

    “Our investigation within the diplomatic circle shows that former President Olusegun Obasanjo only requested for Abacha’s loot and turned a blind eye to the other looters. We demand that a blanket request be made; for we need the billions of dollars to invest in critical infrastructure, revamp our decayed social services and stem gross unemployment.”

  • N500m debt recovery: Committee suspends SAN

    N500m debt recovery: Committee suspends SAN

    The Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Maryam Aloma Mukhtar, yesterday led the Legal Practitioners and Privileges Committee to suspend a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Chief Ajibola Aribisala, pending the final disposition of a petition against him in a N500million debt recovery for Fidelity Bank Plc.

    Aribisala will lose the privileges he has been enjoying in court as a SAN.

    The committee took the decision after a two-hour session in Abuja where the petition against Aribisala was considered.

    According to sources, the CJN and the committee wielded the big stick as part of the ongoing reform of the nation’s Judiciary.

    It was learnt that Justice Mukhtar has vowed not to condone any act of misbehaviour from the bench and the bar.

    Fidelity Bank Plc said it engaged Aribisala to recover a N500million debt, but he allegedly unilaterally deducted N163million as his fee without the knowledge of the bank.

    The bank also alleged that the debt was recovered in two tranches of N300million and N200million.

    The petition also claimed that when the first tranche of N300million was recovered, Aribisala allegedly kept the bank “in the dark” until it got to know of it from another source.

    A source said: “Despite that a counsel is entitled to his fee, there must be full disclosure, which Aribisala was alleged to have violated.

    “When the issue came up, the suspended SAN went to court to stop any attempt to look into the complaints against him.

    “The Privileges Committee established a prima facie basis to conduct an investigation into the conduct of Aribisala. It is on this premise that he has been suspended. The suspension is indefinite until the case is disposed of.

    “If it involves engaging anti-graft agencies, the Privileges Committee will do so to get to the root of the matter.

    “At the session, the CJN said she would not compromise on the ongoing reforms in the Judiciary. She said all SANs must be prepared to live above board or else they would face disciplinary action.

    “She told members of the committee that ‘the era of impunity is gone.”’

    It was also learnt that the committee is awaiting an application from a former Minister of Justice, Mr. Mike Aondoakaa, for a reprieve and restoration of his rank as a SAN.

    The source added: “Although by now Aondoakaa ought to have finished serving his suspension, he still needs to write the committee to restore his SANship.

    “We are awaiting his application. But he has comported himself well throughout the suspension.”

    Others at the session were the Deputy Chairman of the National Judicial Council (NJC), Justice Mahmud Mohammed; the Acting President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Zainab Bulkachuwa; the Attorney-General of the Federation, Mr. Mohammed Bello Adoke (SAN); six chief judges representing each of the nation’s geopolitical zones and representatives of the Nigerian Bar Association.

  • G20 in search of recovery

    G20 in search of recovery

    When the Group of 20 largest economies meets, their top economic officials will see bad news whichever way they look. Following a year of slowdowns in the big emerging economies, all the rich countries – from the US to Japan, from the UK to Germany – went into reverse in the fourth quarter.

    The US and UK growth numbers – a tiny contraction and a 0.3 per cent quarterly fall, respectively – had been known for a while. This week news that Japan had slipped worse than the USin the fourth quarter (growth was expected) and the eurozone contraction was steeper than forecast added to the misery. France was set back 0.3 per cent; Germany took a bloodied nose with a 0.6 per cent fall.

    It may feel better to be in a hole together. But, ideally, the arrested recovery should focus G20 minds on what they can do to climb out of it together as well. The drags on growth are not mysterious. They relate to a self-flagellating policy of austerity even by those who do not need to pursue it, and to the determination of policy makers in the US and Europe to keep everyone in suspense about their next move.

    As the Financial Times has long argued, austerity is necessary for countries with record-high deficits and reliant on mobile investors. But economies with relative fiscal space, such as the large euro members, or those with captive bond markets – the US and Japan – should relax the tightening. The eurozone’s high priests of fiscal consolidation, especially, should note the effects of squeezing their export markets. In export-dependent countries such as Germany but also Japan, a fall in net trade was one of the most important factors in the fourth-quarter downturn.

    A pact in which countries with fiscal space slow their tightening to ease the adjustment for those without it is desirable, but unrealistic. A lack of will to co-ordinate policies is evident in the universal combination of easy money with a condemnation of competitive devaluation. In truth, the so-called “currency war” is not all bad: if everyone debases their currency, the world will get closer to the monetary stimulus necessary to outweigh excessive fiscal zeal.

    The other clamp on growth is uncertainty in Europe about the future of structural reforms within countries and integration between them. In the US, worries centre on the risk of abrupt fiscal tightening with a “sequester” only two weeks away. The bad growth numbers reflect drops in business investment unlikely to be reversed if leaders cannot give the private sector a clear sense of direction.

    – Financial Times

     

  • Imo to inaugurate committee on oil wells’ recovery

    Imo to inaugurate committee on oil wells’ recovery

    THE Imo State government has constituted a committee to recover its oil wells ceded to other states.

    A research by a consultant showed that about 120 oil wells belonging to Imo State were ceded to Rivers, Abia and Anambra states, among others.

    However, the committee said it was yet to ascertain the number of oil wells belonging to Imo State, which ceded to other states. It, however, added that the state has more than 100 oil wells.

    The Head of Department, Ministry of Petroleum and the Environment, Ifeanyi Onyicha, told The Nation confirmed the development.

    He said the committee was drawn from members of the House of Assembly, the Ministry of Petroleum and the Environment, and Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).

    According to him, when inaugurated, the committee is expected to meet with the Chief Justice of the Federation, the Secretary to Government of the Federation and the Boundary Adjustment Committee.

    The committee is also expected to go to the oil companies operating in Imo State to give them their location maps. With the location maps, he said it would be possible to determine in which state the oil wells fall.

    He assured that the committee would do an in-depth study and analysis and data collection to know the boundary between Imo and Rivers and between Imo and Anambra states.

     

     

     

     

  • North’s governors to Nigerians: pray for Suntai’s recovery

    The Northern States Governors Forum (NSGF) has urged Nigerians to pray for Taraba State Governor Danbaba Danfulani Suntai to recover from the injury he sustained in last Thursday’s plane crash at a farm near Yola, the Adamawa State capital.

    The governor is receiving treatment in a German hospital.

    The Chairman of the forum and Niger State Governor Babangida Aliyu noted that prayers are essential for Suntai to recover and fulfill his vision of a greater Taraba State.

    In a statement in Minna, the state capital, by his Chief Press Secretary, Mallam Danladi Ndayebo, the governor said Suntai has shown the goodwill and fatherly disposition to the people and the government he leads.

    Aliyu said prayers can sustain the injured governor and enable him to return to do more for his fatherland.

    He said: “Governor Suntai means well for Taraba State and has demonstrated this in words and in actions. It is, therefore, for this reason that we seek fervent prayers for his quick recovery to enable him fulfill his vision of a great Taraba State.”

    Hailing the medical team that treated the governor before he was flown to Germany, the forum chairman particularly praised the management and workers of the Federal Medical Centre in Yola and those of the National Hospital, Abuja.

    Aliyu hailed them for stabilising Suntai and his aides before they were flown abroad.

    The statement wished the injured governor and other victims of the crash quick recovery.

  • Orji prays for Suntai’s quick recovery

    Abia State Governor Theodore Orji has praised God for sparing the life of Taraba State Governor Danbaba Suntai and his aides in last Thursday plane crash near Yola, the Adamawa State capital.

    Orji prayed for the quick recovery of his brother governor.

    He urged Nigerians to pray for Suntai, saying he loves his people and is always ready for go the extra mile to meet the needs of the state and its residents.

    In a statement in Umuahia, the state capital, by his Chief Press Secretary, Ugochukwu Emezue, the governor noted that God has saved the nation from what could have been another mourning period, after the Dana Air crash on June 3 in which all 153 passengers and crew members died.

    Orji said God answers prayers, especially when “our Muslim brothers are marking the Eid-el-Kabir festival”.

    The governor noted that Nigerians’prayers for their leaders and the nation have saved and sustained the governor’s life.

    He urged Nigerians to pray more for Suntai.

    According to him, prayers are among the ways the nation can ensure the governor’s quick recovery and the good result the medical treatment he is receiving in Germany will have on his health.

    Orji expressed optimism that Suntai and his aides would recover soon and come back to Nigeria.

    The governor added that Suntai would soon return to his desk and continue in his service to the state.