by Sam Nda-Isaiah

Not so surprisingly, the activities of the federal government have ground to a virtual halt. The vice president is not getting involved in certain aspects of governance in spite of all the lies from certain quarters. And this is perfectly understandable. He will not sign any budgets because, technically, he is still the vice president and not the acting president. The ship of state has been abandoned; even the armed forces currently do not have a commander-in-chief. A few people have jocularly said that the Nigerian government has moved to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia, but this is not even true as the guy in Jeddah is thinking more about his health and no longer has time for Nigeria.

This doesn’t happen in normal countries but Nigeria is a long stretch from being normal. While all that happened, a certain Mairo Yar’Adua, who was introduced to the public as Umaru’s sister, shouted all of us down a few days ago and warned us to stop lying about her brother. We were lying by saying her brother was ill, she said. He was so well that he could rule Nigeria for another 16 years, she added. She also threatened to drag all of us to court if we didn’t desist from impugning the character of her brother.

Many of us were surprised at this new impudent face from Umaru’s household. Is it not bad enough that we have Turai to contend with? Who the hell is this Mairo? We can now see that, all the while, some family members of the president have been taking Nigeria and Nigerians for a ride. She wants her brother to rule for another 16 years? Is that what the marabouts told them? What happened to PDP’s 60 years? Who told her that her brother was elected in the first place? Are there no senior male members of the president’s family who can call the unruly female members to order? Do they want to drag us to their level of illiteracy?

This confirms what some people have all along been saying: it is not Umaru who really wants to continue in power in spite of the obvious incapacity but other people – both relations and greedy associates – who are illicitly benefiting from his continuous hold on power. This is not what we know of the reputable family of the late Musa Yar’Adua, the powerful First Republic minister of Lagos affairs, and General Shehu Yar’Adua, the very powerful chief of staff, supreme headquarters (1976-1979).

We wish Umaru 16 more years or even 60 years on Planet Earth, but he has finished his tenure as the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria – a tenure that was ill-gotten in the first place. As far as the onerous task of the presidency is concerned, Umaru has become an invalid. He is too sick to be president of a very important country like Nigeria. The job wears down even a healthy person and I don’t know why Umaru accepted to be used by the crooked Obasanjo in the first place.

Of course, even Obasanjo, as shady as he was (and still is), did not factor a Turai much less a Mairo, into his scheming. It is because of people like Umaru that the authors of our constitution constructed Section 144 (i), even though it is very disappointing that they placed the grave responsibility of removing a sick president in the hands of the members of the Federal Executive Council.

Umaru has to go now. If he is conscious enough, he should simply be encouraged to resign. He should be told that, in doing so, he would not be the first Nigerian leader. He would be following in the footsteps of at least two others: General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida resigned as president in 1993 with his now famous “stepping aside” speech. And Ernest Shonekan, his successor, also resigned three months later in November 1993. Of course, as we all know, if both of them had not resigned, they would have been pushed out with ignominy. But they (especially IBB) were smart enough to read the handwriting on the wall.

Therein lies the lesson for Umaru and the reason he must respectfully step aside or resign immediately. The alternative could be disastrous for him, the political class and, of course, the nation.

E A R S H O T

The New Nigerian Must Not Die

Do the governors of the 19 Northern states want the New Nigerian to collapse on their heads? Obasanjo was said to have gladly handed over the newspaper – once the most influential newspaper in the country – to the Northern states because he knew the governors would never be serious enough to salvage it. The last set of governors, of course, proved Obasanjo right. Should we expect same from the current set? The only way the New Nigerian could be salvaged would be through total privatisation. The Northern states should raise equity and then sell their shares to individual blocs spread within their states with very strict provisos on disposal of the shares. The Northern state governments must not keep the shares themselves. Managing one government as master has been bad enough for the New Nigerian. To manage 19 masters would be disastrous.

What the New Nigerian needs at this point is fresh injection of large capital, not from loans but equity. It also needs freedom. It needs capital to get new equipment and strengthen its capacity to compete with circulation and advert sales in the newspaper industry. The New Nigerian needs to make a forceful re-entry into the market and only large capital will make this possible.

But the time for indecision has ended. Any further vacillation on the part of the 19 Northern states on this matter could prove to be the end of the matter for this very important institution

by Jerry Uwah

The Republic of South Africa is the continent’s indisputable economic power house. Judging from its annual gross domestic product (GDP), the country’s economic power is not contested by any country in black Africa .

Equally indisputable is the country’s industrial power base. In the days of apartheid when its cruel rulers treated even the tiny mountainous monarchies it encircles with grave suspicion, South Africa stealthily joined the prestigious nuclear club, though it never acknowledged that status until Nelson Mandela became the first black president of a democratic South Africa and dismantled the nuclear weapons.

Even in its determined efforts to acquire nuclear arms in its heyday as the seat of terrorism on the continent, Libya with all its wealth never came close to testing a nuclear device. South Africa is clearly an industrial and economic giant on the continent. Many Nigerians therefore wonder why Africa’s economic and industrial power house would be searching for science teachers in a country as technologically backward as Nigeria. The reason is obvious.

Africa’s industrial giant also has, perhaps, the highest rate of crime on the continent. At least one woman is raped every minute in South Africa . Besides, the literacy rate among its black majority is atrociously low. The root of the equally unrivalled crime rate could be traced to decades of minority rule under the cruel apartheid system.

The white rulers under the apartheid system laboured to ensure that blacks who constitute about three quarters of the population of South Africa were kept in perpetual slavery. The education system only encouraged the few blacks who could afford tertiary education to study the arts while science and engineering courses were the exclusive preserve of the minority whites. Most black South Africans who pursued tertiary education in those days had to sneak out of the apartheid enclave to do so. Nigeria was a major haven for black South Africans seeking tertiary education.

Today, South Africa is an enviable democracy with black majority rule. However, the political power may be in the hands of the black majority, but the essential ingredient of that political power, the economic base of the country, is firmly in the hands of the white minority. Even the civil service which the black majority rulers need to execute policies is firmly in the hands of the white minority.

The reason is obvious: the whites, no matter how few they are, have the technology. And in an era of advanced technology, population has paled into insignificance. Israel has, in the last 60 years, proved without an iota of doubt that one man with the required technology could imprison millions for years without anyone lifting a finger in protest.

That is why it could be said that the black majority reigns but the white minority rules in South Africa. That factor is responsible for the escalating crime rate in South Africa. At least 99.99 per cent of the rapes and robberies in that country are committed by jobless blacks. Most of the criminals lack basic skills.

Except for a few cursory changes in terms of relaxing the rules which barred blacks from holding certain positions in the country’s civil service and political arena, the situation in the economic terrain remains the same. Blacks lack the skill to wrest economic power from whites. In fact they cannot even level up in the next 20 years. Everything remains the way they are because Thabo Mbeki as president of South Africa sought to please the white supremacists who control the economy. He did little to change the status quo in terms of empowering blacks.

That is the background from which one could assess the decision by Jacob Zuma, South Africa ’s new president, to call on Nigeria to recruit science teachers for his country. My assessment of Zuma’s call is that, for the first time in the history of that country, a black ruler is determined to challenge white minority control of the country’s economic and technological power.

Zuma’s decision to call in Nigerian science teachers to the rescue is probably informed by two key factors. The first is that South African whites who command monopoly of science and technology expertise are too few to impart science knowledge to the teeming black populace. Besides, even if there were many of them willing to do what had all along been regarded as an odd job among the white supremacists, the present crop of black political rulers may not be willing to gamble with the idea of entrusting the future of the country into the hands of those whose main task in the last 80 years was to restrict black education to that of acquiring the ability to read and write Afrikaans.

The other factor that might have informed Zuma’s decision is that, since the job cannot be done by insiders, the only outsiders qualified to handle it are Nigerians. Just like our neighbours in the ECOWAS sub-region, the average black South African hates Nigerians, not primarily for their propensity for sharp practices, but more for their adventurous nature. Nigerians may not have the industrial and technological strength of white South Africans, but they are the only blacks on the continent that have registered a foothold in South Africa’s small entrepreneurship.

The Nigerian economy is grossly mismanaged by its corrupt political rulers but even the South African white supremacists know that, from what Nigerians in the Diaspora have been able to accomplish, it is just a matter of time and South Africa would be contesting economic strength with the world’s most populous black nation.

It therefore follows that Nigerians are adjudged by Zuma and his advisers as the only ones on the continent to call the white South African bluff. It is therefore not only an act of honour but a show of comradeship for the Federal Ministry of Education to run to South Africa’s aid at this crucial moment in its ongoing fight against white domination.

The press is up in arms against the federal government’s decision to honour this clarion call from a country that has not only despised Nigerians despite the country’s contribution to the campaign that eventually brought down apartheid, but has done everything to ensure that no Nigerian business thrives in the former apartheid enclave. Some of the editorial comments that canvassed the cancellation of the recruitment drive for South Africa cited perceived dearth of science teachers in Nigeria and the tumbling standard of education to support their position. Some even wondered why further resources should be committed to South Africa when we have nothing to show for the invaluable human and material sacrifices used to end the fratricidal wars in Liberia, Sierra Leone and recently Darfur in the Sudan. Yet others complained that the quality of Nigerian teachers has tumbled drastically and wondered how such teachers as those who failed the aptitude test meant for primary school pupils in Kwara State could be sent to a country as civilised as South Africa . The government of South Africa is aware of this fact, so why is the Nigerian press crying louder than the family of the deceased?

One thing that those opposed to the idea of sending Nigerian teachers to South Africa should note is that Nigeria remains a potential giant of Africa, and that the call from Zuma at a time when South Africa is a key contender for the continent’s slot as permanent member of the UN Security Council is a tacit admission of Nigeria’s leading role on the continent.

No country worth its salt ever sacrifices such privilege on the altar of self-sufficiency. I enjoin the Federal Ministry of Education to go ahead with its planned recruitment drive. However, the background of those recruited for the slot should be thoroughly screened to ensure that no one with criminal records is sent to South Africa to inflict more damage on the country’s murky image.

by Sam Nda-Isaiah

Nigeria must be the only country in the world that currently does not have a commander-in-chief in situ. The man who is supposed to be the commander-in-chief has been in a coma for a couple of weeks and undergoing emergency treatment at a hospital in faraway Saudi Arabia. If your commander-in-chief is in a coma or has a mental problem or is in any such condition or situation that impairs his ability to command, then, you do not have a commander-in-chief. That is the situation of Nigeria at the moment. The office of the commander-in-chief is so pivotal that the occupant of that office has no deputy or assistant in that capacity. The vice president of Nigeria, just like the vice president of the United States, is not the vice or deputy or assistant commander-in-chief. That is why when the president is seriously ill or is in a coma or in an intensive care unit, the vice president is not just assumed to be performing the duties of a commander-in-chief, he is actually sworn in to do so as the acting president, and, in that capacity, he also acts as the commander-in-chief for the period that the president remains an invalid. At the moment, Nigeria’s commander-in-chief is incapacitated and the Nigerian system is so warped and so irresponsible that it has failed to swear in the vice president to act. That is shameful. The reality is frightening.

The Federal Executive Council (FEC), which has been empowered by the constitution, cannot rise to the challenge of the moment. With their tails behind their legs, last week, the FEC members lied before the entire world and said that the president, who at that time was under the needle of sundry doctors in Saudi Arabia, was fit. They certainly didn’t place the nation first.

My elder brother, Alhaji Mahmud Yayale Ahmed, looked at the nation with a straight face and declared that, after all, the president had been away for only nine days…, or something to that effect. For only nine days? Are we serious about running a nation state? In serious countries, they swear in the deputy within minutes of having the kind of situation in which we have found ourselves.

We should continue to pray for the quick recovery of the president because that is the right thing to do, but Nigeria is bigger than any individual. Michael Aondoakaa, the attorney-general of the federation, was even more barefaced. He said the constitution does not have a place for a superhuman president. Yes, the constitution does not have a place for a superhuman president, but it clearly insists on a normal president, and not a president that is perpetually sick and falls in and out of coma so frequently that his job suffers. Our president has been incessantly sick and has not had the clarity of mind to govern, and that is why the nation is falling apart and some people around him are stealing the nation dry and he is not even aware of it.

We all are very sick in one form or the other. I have read and heard very cynical arguments in that direction. But that is true. And we are supposed to pray for our leaders; we are already doing so for Umaru. But while we pray, some leaders should step down to take very good care of themselves because of the nature of their illnesses. Just because all of us are ill one way or the other does not mean we should, for instance, give the keys of a bus filled with passengers to an epileptic patient. If anything happens to the bus and the passengers, as it surely would, you would not blame the epileptic driver but those who handed him the keys.

It is not only the FEC that has displayed a crass dereliction of its responsibility. All the organs of the Nigerian state vested with the weighty responsibility of watching over the nation’s commonweal have preferred to look away. The Senate said it will not discuss the issue. The House of Reps will also not discuss the issue. So the FEC is not discussing it, the Senate will not and the Reps will not. The PDP, the ruling party to which the president belongs, and the Nigeria Governors’ Forum both of which do not have the constitutional authority to do anything have nonetheless lent their voices to the continuation of an invalid president in power. What is this thing in the Nigerian make-up that makes it impossible to remove even a lame-duck president in a coma? Those that have been asking the president to resign or write to the National Assembly have not even thought it through. How can a president in a coma resign? He is not in a position to do that. It is the system and the structures of democracy that would swear in an acting president. And this should happen as a matter of course. It would be like asking Ariel Sharon, the former prime minister of Israel, to resign when he suddenly went into a coma, or asking former President Ronald Reagan to resign after he had been shot. But as it is now, Nigeria has been left at the mercy of the winds.

Those who insist Umaru should remain president at this time are not only enemies of the nation, they are also arch-enemies of Umaru himself. The president must also know that such people only want him in Aso Rock so that they can continue to fleece the nation. The truth is that even if Umaru came back from Saudi Arabia now, he would not be in the required state of mind to continue as president. It is this sickness that has impaired his total concentration on running the country. We have a president that does not attend functions. He could not even go to the stadium to watch the last FIFA Under-17 World Cup finals in which Nigeria was both host and participant. He has not been able to attend the last two United Nations General Assembly meetings in a row. He does not inspect projects, especially his electricity projects to ascertain whether his promised 6,000 megawatts is on course. He has not implemented any budget since he was sworn in as president nearly three years ago. He does not have the capacity to verify all the lies some of his advisers and ministers daily feed him with – and that is for the very few privileged ministers who get to see him one-on-one. More than three quarters of the ministers have not been able to see their president one-on-one. They see him only during Federal Executive Council meetings.

Nigeria is too big and far too important for this kind of situation. Yes, we should be praying for Umaru; we can even constitute a team of prayer warriors to continue to fast and pray for his speedy recovery. But, meanwhile, Nigeria is bigger than any single individual. Nigeria needs a new president.

E A R S H O T

Where Do We Now Stand On Electoral Reform?

It appears that the events of the last weeks have blunted our compulsion for free and fair elections in the future. Much more important than the president’s health is the need for free and fair elections. We should continue to pray for the president, but we must also continue to discuss how we must ensure that all future elections conform with standards of a democracy. If that had happened in 2007, we probably would not be in this confused state today. Free elections must be the future of our nation.

by Hannatu Musawa

My name is TJ and I am a 46-year-old man living with full-blown AIDS. I have a wife and two small children who are, till this day, unaware of the disease eating away at me and probably them as well. I have been aware of my HIV status for the past two years, seven months and three days. My diagnosis was made during one of those routine checkups conducted abroad. Yesterday, during the World AIDS Day, I watched many victims of this disease speak about how they have come to terms with their condition and learnt to live productively with the disease. I admire them and I wish I were one of them, but I’m afraid I am not. Unlike them, I never came to terms with AIDS and I never told anyone I have it. I have been to a few classes organised for HIV and AIDS sufferers abroad, but I made sure that no one in the classes knew me or where I came from.

I know that I am a coward and cruel because I live with a wonderful wife who has cared for me throughout my illness. At the time we got married, we were the talk of the town. She was a beautiful young girl from a prestigious family and I was a dashing young man aiming for the skies. Our wedding was splashed all over the tabloids and people spoke about how perfect and lucky we were. Even though I have always known that there was nothing like perfection in our relationship, I never believed that there would come a time our whole life would be submerged under the shadow of something as dark as AIDS. While I believe that I have infected this beautiful wife of mine, I have not had the courage or decency to tell her that I have repaid her dedication with the cruellest of ailments. I think, but for the fact she may be in denial, deep down in her mind she may have suspected we have the disease.

I never came to terms with the fact I have AIDS and I never will. Even with the body aches, the constant diarrhoea, the never-ending catarrh, the scores of lesions on my body and the torture going on in my psyche, I want to forget that I have AIDS, but I can’t. As I narrate my story, I remember quite vividly that gloomy, dark Wednesday when the doctor took the joy away from my life, when he handed me the death certificate, when he told me I was HIV positive. The diagnosis shouldn’t have come to me as a shock really, because the prospect of HIV had been lingering at the back of my mind. It had worried me a couple of times in the past, but I had always convinced myself that AIDS could never happen to me. But as I lay on my deathbed, in this dark room alone, I know that nobody – I mean nobody – is immune from contracting HIV and AIDS.

For the last two and a half years, I have often found myself trying to pinpoint the moment I contracted this awful disease.

Could it have been the time the barber cut me while trying to do a close shave on my head? What about the time my foot was sliced with a razor during a pedicure in an illustrious ladies’ saloon? Then I also think it may be the time I had a minor surgery to remove haemorrhoids. During the surgery, I lost a lot of blood and had to be given a blood transfusion. But no matter how much I try to convince myself that I contracted HIV through a syringe, blood transfusion or blade, I know that I am lying to myself. If I really and truly want to be honest with myself, I know that no haircut, injection or transfusion was responsible. I know that I got infected with HIV and AIDS through the reckless lifestyle I led.

For many years leading up to my diagnosis, I did whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted and with whomever I wanted. I had a great job and was making plenty of money. I was young, handsome, confidant and charming. I have always had the ability to attract members of the female gender. In fact, way back when we were in school, my friends used to call me the “babe magnet” or “Alexander” (as in Alexander the Great), because I had a reputation as a ladies’ man who could conquer and convince any woman to go out with me. I cannot put into words how hard I tried to keep that reputation. Sometimes, even when I didn’t desire a woman, I would chase her, just to fuel my skirt-chasing reputation and just to show off.

Lord knows I loved women, I saw the beauty in each and every one of them and I relished the attention I got from them. I remember a time in school when a group of us used to play a game where we would bet money on the one, amongst us, who was able to chase the most women in a 24-hour period. It was a known fact within our group that I was almost always the winner.

From my secondary school days to my time in university through to the conclusion of my NYSC, I treated women like a token chattel you could buy in the market, use and discard. I enjoyed the feeling I got from knowing I had such power over women.

As a young boy, my mother used to tell me how much all her friends loved me and thought I was cute. “You have presence and a special aura my son,” she would say. “I know that it will get you very far in life.” Now, as I remember her words, as I look upon my worn frame, I am ashamed to admit that the so-called charisma and aura got me AIDS.

I regret many things in my life. I regret using women the way I did, I regret the fact that I will not be able to grow old with my family and I regret not taking responsibility for my disease. But my biggest regret of all is the fact that I didn’t come to terms with the disease. Just like the people in the television programmes for the World AIDS Day, yesterday, I could have lived a productive life as a person living with HIV and AIDS. All the other people living with the disease are human beings just like me but, unlike me, they had valour, grace and dignity in the face of adversity. They didn’t let AIDS kill them… I did.

I wish I had the courage to come out publicly and tell the world what has happened to me. I want be able to apologise to my family and to my wife. I want to be an example for all the young men and women who may feel as invincible as I did and warn them that a few moments of pleasure cannot be worth the death sentence imposed by its consequence. HIV and AIDS is real and it has no distinct face, yet it resembles every face. Every person has to be aware of AIDS and take upon themselves not to contract or pass on the disease. But if they do, they must not treat it the way I did. They must try to live and tell others about it. They must learn from stories like mine.

Taking into consideration the advance of my disease and the agony I am in every day, I very much doubt that I will witness another World AIDS Day. If I do, it will be a miracle; if I am gone, I hope for the best for my family, my wife – and I pray for her forgiveness. I also pray that the spread of HIV and AIDS will stop, but, for it to stop, each and every one of us has to be aware of HIV and AIDS.

As I relate my story to you, I would like to use this opportunity, without shame or fear, to do what I should have done two and a half years ago: say that my name is TJ and I am a 46-year-old man living with full-blown AIDS.

by Jerry Uwah

The scene of the world economy is changing rapidly. By this time last year, economic projectors were working on assumptions that the financial meltdown imposed on the globe by the reckless risk managers of America’s unruly mortgage industry would take oil prices to $30 per barrel from an all-time high of $147. Oil prices actually dropped to $33 per barrel by the first quarter of 2009 but the slip did not last. That trend, however, informed the adoption of $45 per barrel as the reference price for the ill-fated 2009 budget. The situation in the oil industry was so fluid that the reference price was keenly contested by economy watchers as unrealistic. Everyone expected the 2009 budget deficit, which was already projected in excess of N1 trillion, to balloon out of proportion as oil price plummets along with oil production which had been strained by the activities of militants in the oil-rich Niger Delta region. The 2009 budget gave its architects myriads of challenges.

Today, the challenges facing the architects of the 2010 budget is quite different. Oil price is sailing pretty close to the $80 mark. Production in Nigerian oil fields has surged to 2 million barrels per day (mbpd), up from an all-time low of 1.3 mbpd as the federal government amnesty programme curtails militancy in the oil-producing areas.

Economy watchers now see the $57 per barrel reference price of the 2010 budget as pretty conservative as everyone expects oil price to cross the $80 mark during the period. In fact, the contention now is that the conservative reference price for the budget would deposit so much money in the controversial Excess Crude Account that it could once again spark off the debate about when and how to share it with the three tiers of government. The reason is obvious: at the current rate of economic recovery in China , India , the United States of America , Europe and Japan , crude oil price could easily surge to levels where the Excess Crude Account would be chalking up $30 per barrel on the quantity of crude oil exported daily. And at current rates, that sum could be surging by $60 million daily.

On paper, the 2010 Appropriation Bill as presented to the National Assembly is a huge pack of goodies. The budget proposal is built around crude production rate of 2.088 mbpd, gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate target of 6.1 per cent and inflation rate target of 11.2 per cent.

The exchange rate reference price of N150 to the dollar in the face of positive growth rate projections in the world industrial nations and its attendant expected surge in crude oil prices would give the federal government huge sums in naira to play along in the domestic market compared to an exchange reference rate of N117 to the dollar in the failed 2008 budget.

With expected surge in incomes, the federal government could comfortably plough the sum of N1.3 trillion into capital projects during the year. The sum is almost two times the amount projected for capital projects in the equally failed 2009 budget. The budget, which the president said is designed as a fiscal stimulus to counter the crippling effect of the current credit crunch on the economy as well as reduce the yawning infrastructure gap, is largely seen as an expansionary budget. It would tackle the near-total darkness that has descended on the land, make considerable impact on the deplorable state of roads, and attempt to diversify the land transportation system by resuscitating the nation’s moribund rail system.

All these are on paper. With three straight failed budgets on a stretch, economy watchers wonder the magic wand that would conjure the full implementation of the 2010 Appropriation Bill, especially when it has to be executed in a crucial election year. Nigeria, in the last three years, has been crippled by clumsy budget implementations. It took the prying eyes of the House of Representatives to discover the sum of N500 billion in unimplemented capital projects in the 2007 budget. The 2008 budget suffered even worse fate in terms of implementation. The 2009 budget, by various estimates, has only managed to record a humiliating 30 per cent implementation rate.

Besides the concomitant failure in capital budget implementation, economy watchers have persistently questioned the senselessly high cost of governance in the land. The last three budgets have seen recurrent expenditures almost tripling capital expenditures, which in most cases suffer crippling under-implementation. While the presidency had almost always returned to the National Assembly with request for approval of huge sums in supplementary recurrent expenditures, capital budgets have always been rolled over with huge chunks of it slipping into private pockets. That is the basis for the pessimism in the 2010 Appropriation Bill.

Equally untested is the hypothesis that the federal government could reverse the crippling credit crunch in the economy with fiscal stimulation which the president and the architects of the 2010 budget proposal expect to accelerate economic recovery through targeted fiscal interventions. The intention of the federal government is based on the belief that the crippling credit crunch in the economy, like what happened in the U.S. , Europe and Japan in 2008, is triggered by liquidity squeeze. Unfortunately, the situation in the Nigerian money market is quite different from that of the developed economies. There are strong indications that if liquidity squeeze was at the root of the current credit crunch, the massive intervention of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in the last four months would have reversed the situation.

The apex bank has reportedly pumped close to N 650 billion into the money market with a view to unnerving a perceived liquidity squeeze, thus empowering banks to open credit lines. The credit has still refused to flow ever since. Aside from the massive intervention from the reserve bank, there have been huge sums pumped into the system from the federation accounts doled out to the three tiers of governments at different times.

In fact, bankers contend that the system is awash with cash to the extent that there are no investment outlets for the excess liquidity. A recent 128 per cent subscription rate for the low-yield federal government bond does not portray a money market in liquidity squeeze.

That assumption is further buttressed by the fact that banks have practically stopped the mobilisation of funds. The result is that deposit rates are plummeting while lending rates continue to surge. “There is no business, so why do you mobilise funds?” quipped a banker who was assessing the possible effect of the federal government’s fiscal stimulation on the credit squeeze. The banks are sitting on a huge mountain of cash. The plummeting deposit rates point to this reality.

The truth, however, is that the banks are not willing to lend because the land is awash with marginal borrowers whose credit ratings are so abysmal that they cannot be trusted with funds at a time when the CBN has upped the ante in risk management. Bankers contend that lending to businesses that used to give them huge margins have been curtailed by the apex bank’s calls for strict provisioning for facilities that in some instances could not rightly be adjudged as non-performing.

Besides, the productive arm of the economy, the embattled manufacturing sector, is deliberately starved of funds because the inclement investment weather in the industry has made loans recovery a Herculean task. No risk manager wants to lend to high-risk borrowers at a time when the CBN demands nothing less than strict compliance with Banks and Other Financial Institution Act (BOFIA) reporting requirements.

Those challenges would have to be tackled for any palliative on the credit squeeze to be effective. There is panic in the money market with risk managers not knowing the way out. The CBN might have to draw up fresh lending rules to get credit flowing once again.

The president passively admitted the inflationary trend in the budget by predicating it on an inflation rate of 11.2 per cent as against the current rate of 10.4 per cent. The 2009 budget was based on an inflation rate of 8.5 per cent. Given these antecedents, the 2010 Appropriation Bill is an invitation to high inflation. Those who set the inflation target of 11.2 per cent are either being deceitful or have grossly underestimated the inflationary dynamics that the policy thrust of the budget would unleash on the economy.

A deficit of 4.87 per cent of GDP, a planned unparalleled expansion in money supply, along with an expected unrestricted rise in transport fares, rents and food prices to be triggered off by the impending deregulation of the downstream sector of the oil industry, would almost certainly push inflation beyond limits. The situation is worsened by the choice of N150 to the dollar as exchange rate for the Appropriation Bill which indicates that, despite expected improvement in oil revenues, the federal government wants the naira to continue its slide against the dollar, with the attendant high cost of living. The naira has lost 20 per cent of its value in the last one year. This is another budget without a human face.

by Sam Nda-Isaiah

Let us pray for our president, but let us pray even more earnestly for the Federal Republic of Nigeria. It should be clear by now that there is a millstone around Nigeria’s neck that only fervent prayers can crack. Our situation is now so dire that our prayers must include that God give us the courage to do what is glaringly the right thing.

Nigeria’s president is very ill. And that is why we should pray for him. We should pray for Umaru not only because he is president of our country but also because he is a father, husband and guardian to many. But Nigeria is a nation, and there are precepts on how nations are run that are so unsentimental and unemotional, and sometimes cold-blooded. The existence of a nation is so important that if, for any reason, its president becomes incapacitated even for a day, an acting leader is created immediately. This is usually to send a message to the world. When the late President Ronald Reagan was shot in the course of his presidency and he was still receiving treatment at a hospital, his deputy, George Bush, was quickly sworn in as president. This remained so until Reagan became fit and proper enough to start taking decisions on behalf of the American people.

Similarly, when Prime Minister Ariel Sharon of Israel fell critically ill, Ehud Olmert was sworn in as acting prime minister immediately; and, because Sharon did not recover fully enough, he never returned as prime minister. How many of us still remember that Sharon is still alive? And then, there is the case of the strongman of Cuba, Fidel Castro. Cuba is not even a democracy but common sense prevailed. When he became too ill to continue as president, he gave way to his brother. Today, Castro is still alive, but recuperating in his home. Cuba is greater than any individual, even if that person is Fidel Castro.

Umaru has had health challenges long before he became president. This is a documented fact. It has even been said that Obasanjo imposed him on the country because of his warped calculation that Umaru would be too sick and would spend most of the time attending to himself, while he (Obasanjo), as the leader of the party, in his position as the permanent chairman of the Board of Trustees of the PDP, would be the de facto president. That way, he would have got his third term through the back door.

Well, at least Obasanjo succeeded in part. Though he has not succeeded in getting his third term through the back door – thank God for that – he has succeeded where it hurts most. Our nation now bears the brunt of his selfishness. For more than two years now, Nigeria has been led by a president who has spent more time on his sickbed than he has thinking about how to solve the problems of the country. That must explain why, since he became president, no budget has been implemented by up to 30% and the nation keeps going down the drain.

The official position of the presidency is that Umaru has an acute heart disease. But even an elementary school pupil knows that the president is much sicker. All one needs to do is compare his current photographs with the ones he took on the day he became president. And that was even the time many thought he was too sick for the office of president.

But the subject at issue must now be frontally tackled, and the only way forward is to follow the rules set by the supreme document that we have. If the president is too sick to govern effectively, does the constitution have any sections on how to deal with that? Alternatively, and better still, are there no people who could prevail on the president to be fair to himself and the nation and resign gracefully to his retirement home in Katsina?

I read something curious in The Punch at the weekend. It is to the effect that subtle pressure was being put on Vice President Goodluck Jonathan by an unnamed Northern group to resign so that there would be another election that would produce another Northern president since it is the “turn of the North”. I think that is utter nonsense and it is good to hear that the VP has debunked the story. The only chance for that to have happened was blown to smithereens by Justice Idris Kutigi and three of his colleagues at the Supreme Court in the judgement sustaining the election of Umaru, even though the whole world saw what happened on Election Day. By the way, the majority of the judges that upheld Umaru’s election right from the Court of Appeal down to the Supreme Court were Northerners. If they all didn’t see at the time of their judgements that they would not only be doing the right thing by annulling the glaringly fraudulent election but also be acting in the best interest of the North and Nigeria, then we all now have to face the music. If Umaru becomes incapacitated – or remains in Saudi Arabia for longer than necessary – then Vice President Jonathan should be sworn in as president. That would be the right thing to do. We must follow exactly what the constitution stipulates.

But we do not even have to wait to get that far. It is clear even at this point that Umaru has to step aside and let the country move on. If no one in the National Assembly has the spine and love of country to tell him this, then let us all troop to Turai and beg her to get her husband to go home. And if Umaru went on his own, he would have created at least one legacy that history would remember him for.

All said, I wish Umaru well. In spite of our glaring differences, I still think he remains a very decent man. I also wish him God’s blessings, and a quick recovery, and a blissful life in retirement as a former president of Nigeria.

E A R S H O T

6,000MW: Are We Still On Course?

It’s barely 30 days to our promised attainment of 6,000 megawatts of electricity. I hope nobody comes to tell us that they could not attain it because the president was sick. And while we wait, it will interest our leaders to know that Ghana intends to source electricity by nuclear energy by 2018 and that South Africa is already working on increasing its current 40,000 megawatts to 80,000 megawatts. Dubai city alone generates 16,000 megawatts, while the United States generates over 3.2 million megawatts. But just give us the promised 6,000 megawatts first.

Sam Nda-Isaiah

Last Wednesday in Abuja, governors of the 36 states agreed to pay more attention to the collection of taxes. That is a good move, but I only hope the governors know exactly what they are going into. Collection of taxes is a very serious business in virtually every other country of the world except Nigeria. Until recently, when easy revenues from crude oil started to dry up due principally to falling international prices and the criminal activities in the Niger Delta, governors had paid scant attention to the collection of taxes and other alternative sources of revenue. All they have been doing is wait for the month end for the allocation from the central government.

Governments at all levels in Nigeria probably haven’t placed a premium on taxes because they know they would be compelled to become more accountable if taxes become the main source of revenue. But if there is any lesson to be learnt from the crisis in the Niger Delta, it is that reliance on a mono-product revenue stream is the most harebrained, if not irresponsible, way of running a government.

Before now, the only public servant that took the issue of taxes very seriously is Mrs Ifueko Omoigui-Okauru, the chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), who has taken her interest beyond the call of duty and has had to fight battles on several fronts, especially against dubious tax consultants who act as fronts for some governors. It appears that things are about to change – and it’s about time, too.The good thing about relying on taxes is that the governors would become more creative in getting more people into jobs so that more taxes would be paid. A state that would rely on taxes must necessarily create more jobs. And, as we know, the creation of jobs is the single most important job of any government, even though it does not appear in any way as if those who rule Nigeria today know this.

Today, the president and the governors, not to talk of the local government chairmen, do not appear to appreciate this fact. In Nigeria, the president and the governors are so complacent that they do not even know the employment figures in their domains. When taxes start becoming their main source of revenue, as it should, they will be forced to start paying attention to employment rates. And when people really start paying taxes, they also become more attentive and sensitive to how the money is deployed. If the people start paying taxes, they will start asking, more angrily, why there is no electric power supply, or why the taps in their homes do not run with clean water. The people will also start asking why there are no medicines in public hospitals and why all public schools are dead. The governors’ new agenda on taxes is right on point but they must also consider that people will start asking very rude questions about how their money is used.

No one loves paying taxes even in developed economies, but people pay because they see the benefit of paying. It was President Barack Obama who once said that people don’t like paying taxes but they know they have to pay. It is only through taxes that the wheels of government are run. Evasion of taxes is one of the most grievous offences anyone can commit in very serious countries. It is a very, very intolerable transgression against the state.

Today, Nigerians do not pay taxes because they know their money would be stolen by those in charge. In a country where the richest men are those in public office or those who recently held public office and not businessmen, it is hard to find people paying taxes. But when people think that their taxes will be deployed wisely, they will pay.

Lagos State is an example of a state that relies heavily on taxes. Even though Lagosians are complaining of being overtaxed, more than 90% of them will still vote for Governor Raji Fashola, the incumbent governor, in 2011. In fact, if for any reason Fashola refuses to seek re-election, Lagosians will, for the first time, “down tools” to force a person to join a race – and I am not talking about “area boys” here.

When governors rely on taxes to run their states, they will also create the enabling condition for businesses to flourish. In almost all states of the federation, especially in the Northern states, there are several mineral resources waiting to be explored but the easy money from oil has blocked the gumption to do so. If taxes become an issue, governors will encourage companies, both indigenous and foreign, to set up shops in their states that will generate more revenues from the payment of taxes. And one has not even considered the vast agricultural potentials available in virtually all the states.

In South Africa where taxes are a serious matter, for instance, Trevor Manuel, the super-minister in charge of national planning, had to answer questions from the opposition, about a month ago, as to why he had to purchase a BMW 7-series as his official car. The very powerful opposition had asked him in parliament to return the car for a cheaper one especially because of the cost of maintenance. Trevor Manuel went to great lengths to explain why it would in fact be more expensive to return the car after he had used it for nearly one year. That is the kind of discussion that currently goes on in South Africa.

In Nigeria, nobody asks a governor where he got the money to buy personal houses in London, New York, Cape Town and Dubai, all within the same year in which he also acquired five new personal jeeps and married a brand new state-of-the-art wife. In South Africa and in most other countries, the term “taxpayer money” has meaning. In Nigeria, it is really oil money.Payment of taxes is good, after all.

E A R S H O T

Putting Corruption To Death

EFCC chairman Farida Waziri made an assertion last week that has attracted little attention. She said that we should apply the Chinese-style capital punishment for those who steal public money. It is doubtful if the current members of the National Assembly will ever pass this kind of law – for obvious reasons – but we all must start thinking about it. At some point in this country, it must become the law. There is no point allowing anyone who steals public money and deprives the nation of good schools, good roads, good public transport system, good hospitals and other infrastructure to live. Such a person’s action, of course, must have led to the death of several innocent people, including children.

There should be no argument about this if China, which shows the example, is doing so well. Corruption is Nigeria’s greatest problem, and that is why, today, Nigeria has become a poor country of rich men. And most of the rich men are not even the business people. Today, many local government chairmen are richer than their local governments and many governors (both current and past) are richer than their states. Until we start meting out very harsh treatment, we will surely become a failed state.

People who steal public funds should be joined with murderers, drug pushers, armed robbers and kidnappers and put to death. Their vocation kills the society; that is why.

Leadership Editorial

At the end of a three-day conference last week, state governors under the aegis of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum stressed the need to increase their states’ internally generated revenue (IGR). It was a wake-up call, albeit a belated one. The global economic meltdown, the fall of oil prices in the international market and the crisis in the Niger Delta that cut Nigeria’s oil production ought to have awakened the governors to the need to look inwards. The governors called for new tax laws and the strengthening of tax collection machinery.

Few states can be considered viable in the country. Of the 36 states, only Lagos, Kano and Sokoto generate tangible funds. A recent CBN report reveals that Abia recorded less than 10 per cent in the IGR ranking. The highest performer was Lagos with 63.5 per cent, followed by Sokoto with 46.6 per cent. Many others performed dismally. They all depend on the monthly handouts from the Federation Account. Therefore, agitators for new states lie when they sing about the “abundant human and natural resources” in their areas.

IGR could prove extremely useful to the states when they are collected. But the states fail to collect most of their taxes due to a combination of official corruption and the dubiousness of Nigerian politicians and businessmen.

At the governors’ conference, Edo State governor Adams Oshiomhole suggested heavy taxation of wealthy citizens. That suggestion is unassailable. Rich Nigerians hardly pay any tax. The governors should devise ways of tackling these tax evaders. Luckily, it is not difficult to spot a rich Nigerian. Often, the governors and other members of the executive shield them, partly because they funded their elections or are members of the same political party.

Needless to say, endemic corruption is a cog in the wheel of the states’ progress. Most of the IGR collected by civil servants end up in private pockets. Fake receipts are rampant. Perhaps, e-payment is the way to go. And public servants found to have diverted their state’s revenue should be punished. Where there is no accountability, nobody will be willing to pay taxes.

by Sam Nda-Isaiah

The recent selection of Nigeria to chair the Security Council of the United Nations for the current session, and our overwhelming endorsement by fellow countries of the African continent, is a clear indication that the contest for the permanent seat reserved for the African continent is ours to lose. And, we are clearly and surely going to lose it because we have a president who does not know the value of what is at issue. Unless Umaru’s attitude to the matter changes, of course.

There is a story Ambassador Shehu Malami, Sarkin Sudan and Nigeria’s first High Commissioner to South Africa, told me recently. It was something that happened when he was still the high commissioner, and General Sani Abacha was head of state. Ambassador Malami and some diplomats were in Mafeking, a city two hours away from Johannesburg for a meeting and Nelson Mandela, then president of a newly liberated South Africa was in attendance. After the meeting, Mandela told Malami to see him in Cape Town the following day. Now, apart from being high commissioner, Malami was also friend to Mandela. So, ordinarily, an invitation would not be out of place. But whatever it was that Mandela could not discuss with him right away and preferred him to travel several hours – from Mafeking to Cape Town – to do so would be worth every minute of it. So he left whatever he was doing and boarded the next flight headed in the direction of Cape Town.

In Cape Town, Mandela simply told Nigeria’s high commissioner that he (Malami) and Nigeria should be assured that South Africa was not going to compete with Nigeria for the United Nations permanent seat. He said the whole of Africa saw Nigeria as the leader and wanted her to take her rightful place. He told Malami to convey this message to “my leader”. Malami said he referred to both Abacha and General Abdulsalami Abubakar, who took over from him, as his leader. Malami passed on the message dutifully.

I am not sure South Africa still feels the same way towards Nigeria. In fact, even very small African countries that used to “troop” to Nigeria to pay obeisance now have better things to do with their spare time. Some of them now have reasons to believe that they are now superior to us in some material indices of nationhood. Between the time Mandela gave Ambassador Malami the message and today, a lot of water has passed under the bridge. So many elections have been rigged and our leaders have stolen all our money with Obasanjo topping the chart. Nigeria can still not provide its citizens with drinking water, the electric power situation has actually become a scandal. Nigerians these days troop to Ghana, Egypt and South Africa to get both quality education and meaningful health care. And Nigeria still imports fuel even though it is Africa’s largest producer of crude oil. In a nutshell, Nigeria is not serious.

Many African countries now see Nigeria as a big-for-nothing elder brother and responsible siblings do not cede headship of the house to irresponsible elder brothers. Apart from all these, we had a supposedly elected president who shared bribes to parliamentarians to change the constitution to enable him continue in power for life.

Is this the kind of leader the African continent or indeed any other continent would choose to lead it? And to compound our problems, we now have a president who doesn’t engage the world at all. For a country that seeks the permanent seat on the security council, is it not funny that its president has not attended the United Nations General Assembly meeting in the last two consecutive years? While other nations were juggling for influence during the last general assembly meeting in New York, our president invited himself to the opening of a university in Saudi Arabia. As it is now, Egypt would get the endorsement of the United States, so we will need to start cultivating support from other power centres. And to stand a fighting chance of clinching what should naturally come to us, we will have to start behaving ourselves properly and Umaru has to convince the world that he even understands the worth of that position.

To be sure, Nigeria should get it. We have contributed more to the security of sub-sahara Africa than any other country. We have (at least in the past) bailed out several African countries. We have restored democracy to several African countries even though we have continued to rig our own elections. Nigeria still has the highest troop contingent in Darfur. Nigeria was instrumental in bringing stability to Liberia and Sierra Leone. We were in the forefront during the struggle to end apartheid in South Africa and during the struggle for the independence of Angola and Zimbabwe. Nigeria remains the intellectual hub of Africa and we have no extra-territorial ambitions. But simply because you deserve something does not mean you will get it. The world cannot predict a country that is not a democracy and even though our government deceives itself, the enlightened world still does not call us a democratic country. We do not have the overwhelming population and power like China to overcome this democratic credentials, and Nigeria needs to start inspiring confidence in other nations.

Our own Professor Ibrahim Gambari, currently a technocrat with the United Nations recently declared that we are not doing enough to win the permanent seat on the security council. More than any Nigerian alive, Professor Gambari should know.

EAR SHOT

What Is Qatar Airways Still Doing Here?

For whatever reasons, it appears that Qatar has decided not to issue tourist visas to Nigerian citizens anymore. Recently, all the Nigerians who were billed to attend a conference in their country were blackballed and refused entry visas, and this has been going on for quite sometime. Qatar Airways, however, is daily making a killing in Nigeria flying Nigerians from Lagos on every single day. Nigerian passengers are usually those who would connect to Dubai, India, Saudi Arabia and China. So even though the Qataris are interested in the money Nigerians spend patronizing their 5-star airline, they do not want to see our faces. Isn’t it time someone in the Nigerian government stopped this insolence? Maybe Qatar Airways should also be blackballed!