DO YOU KNOW THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH BOLA AHMED TINUBU (APC) BEING PRESIDENT OF NIGERIA, AND PETER OBI (LP) BEING THE VICE PRESIDENT OF NIGERIA?

DO YOU KNOW THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH BOLA AHMED TINUBU (APC) BEING PRESIDENT OF NIGERIA, AND PETER OBI (LP) BEING THE VICE PRESIDENT OF NIGERIA?

“Many forms of government have been tried and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.” — Winston Churchill

Honestly, the problems Nigeria is facing today are not peculiar to the country alone. Many other countries all over the world are facing similar challenges also, let’s reflect on a few. According to (Millson), Of the 167 territories surveyed, just 21 were deemed to be full democracies, representing 6.4% of the world’s population, while 53 fell into the “flawed democracies” category. Topping the list were Norway, New Zealand, and Finland, while the U.K. ranked 18th. The U.S., which was given a flawed democracy classification, fell one spot to number 26. Afghanistan and Myanmar took the bottom two spots, just below North Korea.

The point I am making is simple - No one has all the answers, but we can always challenge ourselves to do better, as a country in general with collective and collaborative efforts.

If not the division, inequality, lack of unity and peace, there is nothing wrong with either a Muslim-Muslim, Christian-Christian, Muslim-Christian or Christian-Muslim tickets to run for public offices in general. 

Do you know there is really nothing wrong for Bola Ahmed Tinubu (APC) to be President of Nigeria, and Peter Obi (LP) to be the Vice President of Nigeria, perhaps Atiku Abubakar (PDP) and Rabiu Kwankwaso (NNPP) sacrificing leadership roles to allow for this unique and unthinkable situation to come to reality, for the benefit of the Nigerian people, provided they all share common vision and ideals.

The problems of Nigeria are beyond ethnoreligious sentiments, EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED, let’s just imagine: 

Starting with crime, is it possible that a high rate of unemployment correlates with a high rate of crime? A few months ago, I thought the unemployment rate was at 33%, and perhaps it will take some time before this number changes, surprisingly the Guardian published “Unemployment and a nation’s 40 percent of hopelessness”

https://guardian.ng/opinion/unemployment-and-a-nations-40-per-cent-of-hopelessness/ 

At least, you are aware that high unemployment leads to crime, which ultimately creates insecurity among other things. So, if you estimate Nigeria’s population at 210 million people, 40% simply means 84 million people are unemployed, and this number is rising.

It might interest you to know that nobody will visit and tour a country that is highly insecure, so invariably your tourism industry will be impacted.

Moving to stable electricity which has been a major challenge in Nigeria for decades - “Blackout worsens as grid collapses for the fifth time in 2022”.

https://punchng.com/blackout-worsens-as-grid-collapses-for-fifth-time-in-2022

Do you think Nigerians will be able to compete globally, when it comes to global production, when the cost of production will already include additional overheads from running generators?

When other countries see and hear Nigeria chanting “Green Energy”, trust me they are just laughing at the ideators as a joke - it’s evident because it doesn’t fit.

For clarity, there is no big deal for people that have had opportunities in government in the past, or over the years to own and run big corporations in a country, provided that they have leveraged such opportunities to improve the livelihoods of their countrymen and women. You can read about Bernardo Matte Larraín from Chile, and how their family business had provided electricity for Chile for decades, in partnership with the government and other providers. 

Read Colbun and the Future of Chile's Power

https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/files/heep/files/day_1_sess_3_colbun_for_reinhardt.pdf 

Don’t you think that there is a problem when a country with a 40% unemployment rate, suddenly experiences high growth in real estate development, but for some unknown reasons, many of her citizens cannot afford both the rent and mortgages for these accommodations? And someone peeps into the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), and observed that it has been crawling in recent years, and also looked at the dollar ($) rate in relation to the local currency, and observed the exponential increase over time - don’t you think that everyone knows what's happening?

Peter Obi might not necessarily win the coming presidential election, but it’s evident that his personality is invaluable, and such caliber of a leader should be given the opportunity to be among the top drivers of the Nigerian economy, and also unhindered to contribute towards policies and initiatives that will help the average Nigerian moving forward. I believe that he is human and not perfect, but his well-meaning intentions for the country is indispensable, as he has a proven track record to validate his deeds and actions, and ultimately similar type of Nigerians should be hunted for, and placed in valuable positions irrespective of ethnicity and religious background.

This current APC administration made some great contributions to infrastructure i.e. railways, roads e.t.c., it is OK to applaud them where it matters, and also criticize them constructively where they erred, and could have done better, for example, how could you have explained the motives behind the policies implemented by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), when the head has presidential ambition? Or how can you blame the INEC chairman when he makes decisions about CBN, with the storage and movement of sensitive election materials?

But this does not also suggest that the CBN has not done well in some areas on certain initiatives, monetary policies, and the stability of the naira against the USD ($) for some years now.

How productive is an average Nigerian graduate today? How can they be productive, when many of them are products of a theoretical system, that has neglected pragmatic approaches to learning and knowledge delivery and has embraced an inefficient way to access and grade students because they have also been starved of quality funding and remuneration over time. The survival instincts of lecturers and tutors in academia have also been triggered towards money, and not quality education, and rigorous research works - if this is what we are injecting into the Nigerian system, what kind of output do we expect? Apparently, initiatives like the TETFUND have been abused so deeply, aimed to mitigate the gaps we are experiencing in the educational system today.

Do we expect to plan corn, and reap apples?

“They are creative, but they lack funding and guidance, so you must decide a proper way of funding. This particular sector should have no less than 30% of lending today. The money you are borrowing and throwing away should be diverted to SMEs,” Obi said. (Ukpe)

Many Nigerian youths are working so hard to be successful despite all the bottlenecks and challenges presented by the system. Not all youths are fraudsters, and accordingly, the Nigerian government can borrow a whopping $600 billion to support the 84 million unemployed youths and SMB owners, perhaps on an N5 million long-term loan for i.e. 5 - 7 years, with a single-digit interest rate i.e. 7%, for them to appreciate the value of money, with a moratorium of 6 - 12 months before repayment commences. This funding can be disbursed directly through the CBN, using the eNaira accounts so that the miracle workers don’t divert such funds from reaching the targeted people.

Do you think this kind of initiative will be impactful, reduce unemployment and poverty in the land e.t.c? if done right? I believe so.

We can move on to the health system, how have medical doctors and the medical system been treated over time? If they have been provided for accordingly, why will doctors be leaving the country in numbers for better opportunities elsewhere? Are we so money-driven, that we have no value for human life any longer? The Covid-19 pandemic was an example of why countries should have functional health systems, despite many will still be overwhelmed in disease breakout situations as we know.

What is Nigeria’s identity today globally? What are we known for? How did we get here? How can we correct things? What can we learn from other countries? How can we be apologetic for our ineptitudes and redeem ourselves? Nigeria is among the countries with the highest number of religious houses (mosques and churches), are we convinced that these are the plans God created for us?

Can we just think differently about our current situation and decisions on leadership, money, lifestyle, corruption, economy, health, education e.t.c?

As civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr once said. “The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires but in his integrity and in his ability to affect those around him positively.”

Thank you.

Aderogba Otunla.

Works Cited

Millson, Alex. “' Flawed' U.S. Falls Down List of World's Most Democratic Countries.” Bloomberg.com, 9 February 2022, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-10/these-are-the-world-s-most-and-least-democratic-countries. Accessed 14 June 2022.

Nnodim, Okechukwu. “Blackout worsens as grid collapses for fifth time in 2022.” PunchNG, 13 June 2022, https://punchng.com/blackout-worsens-as-grid-collapses-for-fifth-time-in-2022/. Accessed 14 June 2022.

Ukpe, William. “We'll rather starve than borrow for consumption under my watch - Peter Obi.” Nairametrics, 12 April 2022, https://nairametrics.com/2022/04/12/2023-what-nigeria-needs-to-do-to-kick-start-the-economy-peter-obi/. Accessed 14 June 2022.

Utomi, Jerome. “Unemployment and a nation's 40 percent of hopelessness.” The Guardian Nigeria, 24 March 2022, https://guardian.ng/opinion/unemployment-and-a-nations-40-per-cent-of-hopelessness/. Accessed 14 June 2022.

#BolaAhmedTinubu #PeterObi 🇳🇬 #AtikuAbubakar #APC #PDP #LP