Though Nigeria has been grossly mismanaged especially in the last eight years and it is getting worse under the current regime, she can yet be redeemed. The easiest and fastest route is to just copy the template of Abia State under Dr Alex Otti and paste it on Nigeria and voila, a new Nigeria is birthed.
Abia State was rotten under the PDP for 24 years, but it has taken the new administration of Alex Otti just eight months to change it’s trajectory.
Virtually every critical part of Abia State that needed to be fixed to put the state back on track has been touched. There is massive infrastructure upgrades from roads to the retrofitting of schools and hospitals to clearing of arrears and prompt payment of salaries and pensions to clearing of filth and refuse to lighting up the major streets. In fact, the governor will be commissioning the Geometric Power Plant in Aba this week. This is a private sector initiative that will power the entire nine local governments that make up the commercial city of Aba. Guess what, the Chief Executive is no other than Prof Berth Nnaji, a former Minister of Power.
Several high networth individuals, corporate organizations, multinationals, embassies and multilateral organisations have been trouping to Abia State to have meetings with government officials with a view to knowing where and how they can be relevant to the government and people of the state.
Yo Shinai, Yo Kangai is a popular Japanese phrase that means ‘good product, good thinking’. People know a good product when they see one, they do not need to be compelled to identify with it.
Unlike previous administrations in Abia State you hardly see or hear of any jingles advertising the state or praise singing the governor, there are no publicity campaigns either. I only know of one foreign trip by the governor I think to Poland and it was at the behest of the Polish ambassador to Nigeria and Polish businesses have since taken positions on areas of interests in the state just like other foreign governments are doing.
The governor is running the state on a need-to-fit basis. He has a very lean but highly sophisticated and effective team.
Just last month he inaugurated the Abia Global Economic Advisory Council made up of diverse technocrats, prominent and pre-eminent men and women from various facets of life including the Director-General of the World Trade Organization, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and the former Emir of Kano, His Eminence, Dr Lamido Sanusi Lamido as Co-Chairs. Other members include former Director-General Securities and Exchange Commission, Miss Arunma Oteh and Mr Bolaji Balogun, CEO of Chapel Hill, Denham. No government in Nigeria whether state or federal has ever dared to think of such a Council talk less of pulling such heavy weights from all over the world and guess what, they are all serving pro bono.
It goes to show that the man at the helm of affairs in the state came prepared. He has a clear vision and idea of what he wants to do and he is carefully executing them seamlessly at minimal costs. Most importantly, he is able to do all of these and even more because he has the legitimate mandate and authority of the people.
Like I said ab initio to redeem Nigeria is not rocket science. Even if you are daft and bereft of ideas, all you need to do is just copy and paste the Abia model and you are good to go.
Inflation can be curtailed. The free fall of the naira can be stemmed. Insecurity can be reduced to the barest minimum. With our vast untapped arable land we can achieve zero hunger in the land in less than a year. We can pull our people out of multidimensional poverty. More people can be gainfully employed. Our children that are out of school or that have never been to school can go to school. We can reverse medical and educational tourism and also fundamentally reverse the japa syndrome.
How can these be done? Very easy!
1. Muscle the political will to end terrorism. Lt. Gen Azubuike Ihejirika did it as Chief of Army Staff under president Goodluck Jonathan. He pushed the so called Boko Haram insurgents from about five states they were occupying into the Sambisa forest and as he was about to annihilate them there the Northern establishment came up with their ethno-religious propaganda that he was killing their people and Johnathan was blackmailed into sacking him. They regrouped and became more formidable.
With the right political will insurgency, terrorism, kidnapping for ransom and all the criminal activities taking place all over the country will be a thing of the past. If you fix insecurity you have solved close to half of Nigeria’s problems.
2. Nigeria’s population is about 220 million and with a land masse of about 925,000km², our GDP in 2021 was a paltry $441 billion. Conversely , Malaysia has just about 35 million people, but with a land masse of about 331km² their GDP in 2021 was almost $400 billion. We need to get our massive land masse and population to work for us.
If you take care of insecurity farmers will go back to the farms. Government has to bring back farm Extension Workers and Price Commodity Board. Encourage small holder farmers. Subside seedlings, fertilizers and improved varieties of crops, plants and animals. Build silos all over the place. Buy excess produce from the farmers at good prices. Encourage everybody to have a farm at their backyard and finally encourage consumption of locally produced foods.
3. Trim the size of government. We don’t need 48 ministers. America is the world’s biggest economy. It’s population is about 332 million and with a GDP of over $23 trillion America has only 15 ministries and they are accountable to the American people. The UK has a population of just about 70 million people. Their GDP is well over $3 trillion. Yet there is is nothing like a fleet of jets for the Prime Minister or other Ministers.
4. Government officials should pay out of their pockets for every unofficial or not-on-the job expenses they make.
5. Curb unnecessary foreign travels right from the President to the least person.
6. Sell off most of the jets in the Presidential fleet. At this time we don’t need more than two jets in the Presidential fleet if at all we must have any.
7. Official vehicles and other paraphernalia should be for the very top people and for sensitive positions only. Others should use pool cars and so on.
8. Effective system should be put in place to curb corruption. Cash transactions or exchange should stop forthwith. Only publicly quoted prices should be used for supplies and contracts.
9. Dilute dependence on fossil fuel. Develop other sources of energy such as wind, turbine, coal, solar, etc.
10. Do a forensic audit of both the CBN and all commercial banks to find out how they disbursed the FX allocated to them since 1999. Make a scapegoat of anybody found wanting. In addition to jail term anybody found to have been involved in round tripping should be made to return the funds.
11. Track the disbursement and use of FAAC allocated to States and local governments. Anybody found to be diverting the funds or buying FX should be severely dealt with and the funds in question be forfeited.
12. Massively encourage production of local substitutes for goods imported into the country.
13. The politically contrived six geo-political zones should be scrapped and instead replaced with regions or states with comparative advantage in features, characteristics and idiosyncrasies such as farm produce, IT, manufacturing, Textiles, Leather, Shipping, etc.
14. There should be massive investment in such infrastructure as road, rail and water transportation cutting across states and regions to aid the free flow and movement of people and goods across the country.
15. Similar investments and upgrades should be made in schools and health facilities. There are roughly 20 million Nigerians in the diaspora. A lot of these are highly educated professionals majorly in teaching, tech, engineering and medical fields. If our facilities are upgraded to international standards and people are well remunerated and the general operating environment conducive many of these people will come back and even bring in their own funds. Last year Nigerians in the diaspora remitted close to $25 billion dollars into the country.
16. Convert Yahoo to silicone valley. The ingenuity of our young people is unparalleled. Unfortunately, due to the situation they find themselves they have diverted their ingenuity to wrong uses. Concerted efforts can be made to debrief these our great assets, incubate them in a hub and convert their negative and unscrupulous nature into a major tech asset for the country.
17. Give tax holidays and other incentives to organisations willing to set up factories, assembly and manufacturing plants in the country and make it easy for them to repatriate their funds.
18. Give mouth watering incentives and grants to organisations that export processed goods in the country.
19. Pass a law that no organization will bring more than 10% of it’s workforce into the country. No matter what. They should train our people to do the job.
20. Above every other thing be transparent. Lead by example. Lead from the front. Do what you preach. The fish rots from the head.
The list of what can be done to turn our situation around for the better as soon as possible is endless. Can it be done? Of course, yes, it can be done. It has been done elsewhere. Rwanda is a classical example. Tanzania is not doing badly.
The simple truth is that you can only do as much if your authority is legitimate. An imposter that was not duly elected by the people will just be groping in the dark seeking legitimacy. It is not enough to steal the mandate, what do you do with it?
Prince Ikenna Charles Oham
ikennaoham@gmail.com