Eze Onyekpere
It is a fundamental truth of humanity that the first step towards resolving a challenge is the acknowledgement of the challenge and its magnitude as a basis for its interrogation with a view to devising solutions. Challenges may also be viewed as opportunities to bring out the best in us, to unravel latent potential, to energise our dormant capacities and to question our claims of being equal members of the human race with other peoples. Living in denial never solves a challenge. Instead, it complicates and allows the challenges to mutate. We must reference a challenge in its entirety and magnitude and earnestly seek to find solutions and answers to all its manifestations.
It is an aphorism that one can lie to others, but cannot lie to oneself, because a lie in its very nature as a locution deliberately antithetical to verities apprehended by the intellect is a denial of our nature as human beings. Enter the Nigerian economy and the incredible capacity of our leaders to live in denial. Our leaders or more appropriately our rulers, are living in denial of the truth that Nigeria is broke and would have been presented for liquidation or winding up proceedings if it were a private company trading for profit. Playing with words on whether we have a debt, or a revenue challenge is mere semantics that runs away from the fact that we cannot fund the basic running of our governance.
What does the official facts state and what do they show? Fast forward to the performance of Nigeria’s 2020 federal budget as the barometer to do a reality check on who we are and where we are in the economic and fiscal equation. As of year end 2020, the Federal Government’s retained revenue, which is the actual earned income before borrowing was N3.94 trillion, being 73% of target for the year. However, the expenditure was N10.08 trillion which is 101 per cent of projected expenditure. The implication is that we spent N6.14 trillion which we did not earn. Actual income was 39.08 per cent of actual expenditure meaning that we did not earn up to 50 per cent of what we spent. We spent an extra 60.92 per cent which we did not earn.
Out of the expenditure, we used N3.27 trillion for debt service and N3.19 trillion for personnel cost, including pensions. Using N3.27trillion for debt service means that we used 82.99 per cent of our income for debt service and for every N100 we earned, we used N82.99 kobo or more appropriately N83 to service debt. This implies that we were left with only 17 per cent of our income after debt service. In real numbers, it means that after servicing debts, we were left with N670billion. And what was left was not enough to pay salaries and pensions. So, we had to borrow, N2.521 trillion to complete the amount required to pay salaries. Now, borrowing to pay salaries and run recurrent expenditure is contrary to the provisions of the Fiscal Responsibility Act which states that the proceeds of borrowing should be channeled to capital expenditure. It is also clear that whatever was used to finance statutory expenditure, overheads and capital expenditure were borrowed funds.
Clearly, this fiscal scenario is not sustainable in the short, medium or long terms. Whether it is a debt, revenue or any other name challenge is immaterial. The fact is that there is an economic and fiscal crisis. How do reasonable leaders respond to this kind of scenario? Do they continue business as usual and keep claiming that they have improved the nation better than they met it? Pray, has Nigeria ever been in this type of dire fiscal scenario? Of course, the answer is in the negative. If the position of this discourse is not true, it challenges the economic and fiscal managers to bring empirical evidence (not vulgar abuse) to controvert this position. The President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.)’s assertion that he has improved Nigeria in this kind of economic situation (excluding the degenerated security situation) reaffirms that street belief that he has lost the capacity, either due to infirmity of mind or body, to understand what is going on around him. Alternatively, presenting such an assertion of having improved Nigeria, contrary to empirical evidence, unimpeachable facts and the lived experiences of a majority of Nigerians is either deliberate mischief or a calculated insult on the integrity of hard-working Nigerians. The budget figures reeled out above were taken for the budget briefing of the minister of finance, budget and national planning. Thus, who is deceiving who? Nigerians are not and can never be deceived.
How can the President in good conscience sustain the claim of having improved the economy when he met the naira at a value of less than N200 to the United States dollar and today, it practically exchanges for almost N500? He has improved Nigeria by ensuring that students in public tertiary institutions have lost one year due to the failure of his regime to stem the university lecturers’ strike. He has improved Nigeria when unemployment is at all-time high? He has improved Nigeria with the rooftop inflation rate especially the food inflation which is compounding the miseries of Nigerians?
Reasonable leaders in this kind of scenario come out to engage citizens and tell them how bad the scenario has degenerated, propose ideas, policies and frameworks that reflect the reality of austerity and start a national conversation of how to come out of the dire economic straits. Furthermore, the leadership cut down the perks of office across board, reducing waste, recovering outstanding resources due to government from different sources as well as provide opportunities for all citizens with ideas and competencies to contribute towards resolving the national challenge. The leadership will also ask for sacrifice from citizens after demonstrating their own sacrifices and unmistakable commitment to the public good. Essentially, a national momentum for improving the economy will be built where every citizen irrespective of their background will have a sense of compulsion to contribute to economic revival with a hope of also benefitting from the same when the economy rebounds.
It is time Buhari and his economic team woke up to the fact that they have failed Nigerians and they need to take targeted steps towards getting the economy back on its feet; the management of the economy needs fresh knowledgeable men and women who are attuned with modern economic management and common sense. We need square pegs in square holes. The current economic situation is not in the interest of a majority of Nigerians.
The hardship is too much; the President should stop indulging himself with fiction and positions which he knows are untrue. His leadership has degenerated the Nigerian economy. Start living in the reality of the circumstances of Nigerians and take steps to change things for the better.
