Saving For The Rainy Day

The Nigerian economy is
undergoing turbulent times and the entire nation is caught  in the web of the sordid economic reality. The nation has lost 40% of its revenue from its monolithic oil resource base for the past six months as a result of accelerated decline in global oil price. There has been a gross depletion in foreign reserve, shrinking of federation account, and a drooping allocation sharing to the various tiers of government.
Expectedly the Nigerian masses are paying dearly for the economic depression through a high cushioning effect and austerity measure. Regrettably, our leaders, the custodians of our national treasury that owe us explanation over the management of our common wealth are indulging in escapist measures to obviate their sense of responsibility.
In recent times our national leaders have engaged in verbal invectives and tirades of blames over who should receive the highest odium for the sorry state of our economy.
The situation is worsened by the fact that politicians are mopping up their loots for another election year. This has been exemplified in the sudden frugality on expenditure and release of funds for the running of the economy. Vested political concerns have taken prime schedule at the expense of targeted budgetary spending and project execution. Civil servants are groaning under the pangs of lack as a result of backlog of unpaid salaries, while the entire Nigerian citizenry are yoked under enhanced servitude.
While the likes of OBJ and IBB have addressed the perilous times with a sense of self exoneration, President Jonathan’s recent confession at a political rally in Lagos State serves as a glaring indictment of our past and present leaders over the mismanagement of our national treasury.
Addressing a tumultuous crowd of supporters and apparently reacting to swipes against his anti-corruption posture by the opposition, President Jonathan had confessed that his generation had failed Nigerians. A somberly President Jonathan had also charged Nigerian youths to take their destiny in their hands by working to salvage Nigeria from the throes of institutionalized corruption.
The implication of the President’s confession is that Nigeria’s economic woes date back to decades of misguided governance and decadence stench of perverted leadership at all levels of governance in the country.
Nigeria lost its national sense of probity and accountable leadership shortly after the collapse of the first post colonial era of leadership superintended by the founding fathers of independence. The founding fathers recognised the divergent points of comparative advantage in our national economic fortune.
Prior to the discovery of oil they managed the accruable proceeds from the available resources for the service of the state, and there was economic boom across the length and breath of Nigeria. Driven by patriotic zeal, roads were constructed, schools were built, utilities worked and the people enjoyed a life of abundance. All these were done without the impact of petrol dollars.
Despite their ideological and political differences advanced through the preponderance of regional bargaining, our founding fathers were united in one course; the common resolve to protect the dignity of the Nigerian State and prudent management of state treasury.
As leaders they were moderates and models that created a sense of social economic equilibrium in which the ordinary Nigerian could have a stake in his economic development. The split and blink in our national development process was propelled by the advent of a centralized command system sealed in a unification decree which jettisoned the prospective confederacy that was the hope of socio-political and economic redemption of the nation.
The fusing of the Nigeria State in a precarious process  of corporate existence has proved to be the greatest undoing in the making of the Nigerian State. The principles of human dignity and the tenants of democratic liberties were grossly abused in the leadership transition and succession hijacked by the military aristocratic class. The unfettered access of military rules to state coffers and their inordinate ambition offered them a luxurious indulgence in executive banditry and soiled their oath of allegiance and real constitutional role in nation-building.
Military rule later gained its roots in Nigerian politics through the tacit collaboration of civilian allies in what Nigerian political legend and icon, Nnamdi Azikiwe, branded as ‘diarchy’. The system assumed a notorious height under the reign of Nigeria maximum dictator, Ibrahim Babangida, the longest serving military ruler in the nation’s political history. Babangida, who is now seeking a clean bill of health and a soft-landing, presided over an oil windfall as a serving military president as he chose to be officially addressed. Yet he perfected the displacement of a practical and sustainable approach toward economic development through his pandora box of economic policies and theories, that later turned out to be mere gimmicks of self perpetuation in power.
IBB never saw Nigeria beyond his political ambition and he adroitly pursued his infernal political agenda with a self-serving orgy that whittled the prospect of national growth. IBB never gave proper account of stewardship as a leader and his infamous regime and that of his cronies fell ingloriously to a prolonged rescue mission and intervention by a coalition of pro-democracy proponents and their international collaborators.
Then OBJ came on board in 1999 to navigate the ship of the hard earned democracy. International borders that were shut against the country were opened. Nigerians were hopeful of genuine economic rejuvenation but OBJ also allowed his political ambition to divert his attention from consolidating the gains of democracy. His anti-corruption crusade was selective and he paid his service to the diversification of the economy and promotion of entrepreneurial development in the country.
The middle economic class was eased out leaving a widening gap between the “Super rich” and the “Super poor”. OBJ never saved for the rainy day, and he owes Nigeria an explanation over how he managed our commonwealth.
That our leaders are astounded by the dwindling economic fortune of the country expose their lack of vision, profligacy, desperation for power and incurable incompetence in its execution.
Rather than fall on a reserved surplus to make up for the critical times like the Biblical Joseph in Egypt, our leaders have bequeathed Nigerians with an intractable catalogue of development challenges in all spheres of our national life.
It is therefore time to hold them accountable for what happened to the oil windfall, the excess crude and money accruing from the Subsidy Re-investment Programme (SURE-P). Nigerians must transform from spectators to participants in the nation’s development process and save themselves from possible economic extinction.

Taneh Beemene