President Muhammadu Buhari has consistently raised the alarm that the nation is broke. Assistant Politics Editor, DANIEL KANU, examines many sides of the disclosure.
For President Muhammadu Buhari, it has almost become a singsong to bemoan the sorry state of the nation’s economy at every given opportunity.
The exposure has virtually become a trend, especially during his tours outside the country. In such instances, he hardly minces words in declaring that Nigeria is broke, blaming the situation on corruption and mismanagement of the economy by the immediate past Goodluck Jonathan administration.
On familiar path
The President embarked on the usual path in the course of his visit to India, penultimate week, when he expressed his handicap in running with large cabinet, stressing that the poor state of the country’s economy would not afford him such luxury. Nigeria, he cried, has been fiscally and morally vandalised.
Buhari, had, earlier on Monday, June 22, delivered a ruthless verdict of the Nigerian condition under his predecessor, raising the alarm that he inherited a country with empty treasury.
To substantiate his claim, he promised to make public a comprehensive statement on the economic and financial situation inherited by his administration in a matter of weeks.
Nothing substantial has been made in making good the threat, thus, creating room for critics to run wild in accusing his administration of pursuing an agenda of persecution against perceived opponents.
This insinuation notwithstanding, the President, has continued to lament that his administration was being weighed down by debts running into millions of dollars.
Although Buhari has not disclosed the controversial debt he met on ground, his message has been quite simple: That Nigeria is at a defining moment which has great implications, and something drastic must be done to salvage the situation.
Part of his redeeming measures is constitution of a lean cabinet.
There are even the fears that but for the demand by the constitution, he would not have appointed ministers. Indications to this emerged early in the administration, when he reportedly said he had no need for ministers, dismissing them as noise makers.
Even after naming ministers and forwarding same to the Senate, the President had emphasised that many of them would not be assigned portfolios but would only attend the monthly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meetings.
Previous exposure
Not many were actually surprised at Buhari’s position. He had, shortly after his election, told Nigerians to brace up for more belt-tightening measures as the only way to revive the near comatose economy.
In fact, the Ahmed Joda Transition Committee that was put in place by Buhari (then President-elect) to interface with the former administration of Jonathan for a smooth handover of power on May 29, had given hints on the untidy situation.
Joda, the chairman of the committee, had disclosed that Jonathan left behind a N7 trillion liability, a figure that contradicted claims by senior officials of the previous administration that the country’s debt profile stood at N1.3 trillion.
Said Joda: “We were told at the beginning of the exercise that the government was in deficit of at least N1.3 trillion and by the end people were talking about N7 trillion. Everything is in a state of collapse.”
In similar vein, the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo had alerted that the new government would be inheriting a debt of $63 billion. But former Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had then risen to the defence of Jonathan’s administration, insisting that of the $63 billion debt, the administration only incurred $21.8 billion.
She also said the $63 billion cited by Osinbajo included multilateral and domestic loans by successive federal and state governments since 1960.
According to her, the debts incurred under the Jonathan government were made up of $18 billion domestic component and $3.7 billion external component.
Okonjo-Iweala further explained that the leap in the debt profile between 2012 and 2015 was triggered by the 53 per cent wage increase implemented by the late Umaru Yar’Adua administration.
Okonjo-Iweala was not alone in the defence of Jonathan. Former Deputy Chairman of the National Planning Commission (NPC), Dr. Abubakar Olanrewaju Suleiman, did not mince words in his reaction.
“Buhari lied,” he said, cautioning the president against accusing Jonathan of milking the nation’s treasury dry.
Suleiman stated that the former administration under Jonathan left behind $30 billion. This, he said, was in addition to the $2 billion in the Excess Crude Account (ECA) as at May 29. He explained further that the amount would have been higher, but for the governors’ insistence on sharing the fund.
PDP slams view
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) also weighed in, asking Buhari to be cautious in his utterances on the economy and pay greater attention to it than regular recourse to criticism.
The party returned to its earlier position, following the President’s outbursts in India, accusing him of de-marketing the country. It further tasked Buhari that the economy under his watch has remained on a rapid fall.
In a press statement signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, PDP tasked Buhari to pay urgent attention to the management of the economy if he knows what to do.
The party said its worry stems from the fact that the economy has remained on rapid fall since the last five months apparently due to the absence of clear-cut fiscal policy direction and an economic team to deal with the domestic and global challenges associated with a developing economy.
Part of the statement read: “Whereas the PDP is in full support of the President’s efforts in tackling corruption and insurgency, the party is however concerned about the grave economic situation we now face, as well as indices from global economic watchers, which this administration has failed to give deserving attention, despite its predictable negative impact.
“The situation has become even of utmost concern following the failure of this administration to articulate any interventionist policy at this critical moment, when credible global economic monitors have continued to predict that oil price may fall as low as $20 per barrel.”
A development foretold
To enlightened commentators, Nigeria’s current situation was hardly surprising. At the heat of the 2015 presidential campaign, former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, had seen through the promises by the leading political parties and alerted that it would be difficult to accomplish them in the light of the state of the nation’s economy.
Soludo had then observed that while Jonathan lacked achievements to point to, or clear future plans, Buhari, lacked specific plans on how to salvage Nigeria’s economy.
He warned that neither the APC nor the PDP, presented Nigerians with a comprehensive cost benefit analysis of its programmes which, he insisted, were implementable.
“The UK Conservative Party’s manifesto for the last election proudly announced that all its programmes were fully cost and were therefore implementable. Neither APC nor PDP can make a similar claim. A plan without the dollar or naira value to it is nothing but a wish-list. They are not telling us how much each of their promises will cost and where they will get the money. None talks about the broken or near bankrupt public finance and the strategy to fix it,” Soludo remarked.
Beating about the bush
Critics allege that it is the Soludo prediction that Buhari administration seems to be facing. According to them, the government appears to have been boxed to a corner due to lack of grand economic vision and efficient fundamental planning.
They further expressed worry that for over five months in office, Buhari is yet to assemble his cabinet team with portfolios. The lethargy in constituting a functional team to hit the ground running, counts among the fears by analysts that the administration may not have come to terms with the urgency required in fixing the economy.
“Buhari claimed he knew the problems and was going to solve it and fix Nigeria. So, he should stop complaining and give Nigerians what they want – robust economy, stable power supply, security, employment, at least,” said Edward Badmus, legal practitioner and social critic.
Questionable NASS committees
The inability to sit up to the reality of the situation, is not limited to the executive arm of the government. The legislature, is not spared. If anything, lawmakers, especially in the National Assembly (NASS), are yet to convince Nigerians on their readiness to serve, aside engaging on issues that hardly add value to the survival of the nation. While the criminally neglected citizens are yet to get over the needless leadership crisis that had rocked the APC-led Senate and House of Representatives, both chambers, last week, obviously bloated numbers of committees in a manner that sold the impression that they were not on the same page with Buhari in his alarm on the sorry state of the economy.
While the House of Representatives made up of 360 members constituted 97 standing committees, the Senate, with 109 members completed the bazaar with 65 committees, in a situation that realistically speaking, sees less than two members to a committee.
Even as image handlers of the Senate President, Bukola Saraki and Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, laboured to justify the unwieldy figures, it was apparent that the two officers were more interested in shoring up their support bases, than coming up with agenda that would lift the country from the economic doldrums.
Argument by experts in Political Science and foreign Relations is that it runs against the grain of reasons that the United States House of Representatives with 435 members has 21 Congressional Committees, 20 Standing Committees and one Select Committee, while Dogara’s House of Representatives, with 360 members, has 97 Standing Committees.
Also, whereas in the United States, the Senate has only 20 Committees, Nigeria’s Senate has 65 Committees. Badmus describes the action as sheer waste of resources and misplacement of priorities. According to him, the action by the Speaker and Senate President, was merely to secure their positions and not to lift the country.
“Did it bother them that funds would be needed to run the various secretariats of the committees? Where would the money come from? How do you explain this selfish action to Nigerians that are being urged to tighten their belts? Buhari needs to keep an eye on these fellows,” he remarked.
Walking on tight rope
The President, it is believed in most political circles, seems to be sensing the heat of what he might face with Nigerians given the expectation that heralded his emergence.
At the moment, most Nigerians seem to be losing patience on the slow pace of governance.
There are even insinuations in some quarters that the President may have unwittingly deflated the balloon of enthusiasm that ushered in his government. Their argument is that going to six months that he took over, nothing fundamental has been done aside giving one reason or another as justification.
“I can tell you that most Nigerians that thought Buhari would bring the needed magic to rebuild Nigeria are gradually getting disappointed. I am one of them,” Gladys Achumba, a teacher, told TheNiche.
In a recent write up in The Guardian Newspapers, Paul Onomuakpokpo, asked Buhari to rise up to the challenge of pragmatic leadership, stressing that all the citizens want is for him to translate his promises into policies and programmes that would improve their lot.
He advised the President that all that Nigerians need now is his performance and not excuses.
His words: “Already, Buhari has expressed his readiness to block these leakages. Nigerians expect him to use the revenue to be recovered through the Treasury Single Account (TSA) and reforms at the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to improve the economy.
“Besides, Nigerians expect the President to get funds from his anti-corruption campaign to revamp the economy. If as the President and his political party have always said, past government officials stole the nation’s money and ran the economy aground, he should recover this money and use it to improve the economy.”