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Kay Soyemi (Esq.)
 Social Commentator
SW9, London
UK

more articles by Soyemi

So, for the sake of clarity, can I ask our President and his men to confirm if the Chinese cabal has now replaced the Vaswani cabal and if this ‘loan’ is taken – for which Nigerian benefit? If it is so, I shudder to think what amounts of money Nigeria would talk about as missing or misspent when the present occupier of the Aso Rock throne vacates the office.

Dear God, please protect us from our leaders.


$500 Million Loan – For Whose Benefit?
 by Kay Soyemi

 

“Yar’Adua spoke softly, slowly and made no facial expressions when he observed that Nigeria would have to make hard but necessary steps to reform the system.

“Central to this attitudinal change is the concept of leadership. If you are elected to a political office, it provides the opportunity to become a leader, you have a clear responsibility and the way you handle it will determine whether you are a leader. If you abuse your office in any form, you will not deserve to be called a leader at the end of your tenure,” he said.

Yar’Adua told a packed audience comprising international investors, the diplomatic corps, bankers, businessmen, energy experts and others from all works of life that his administration was setting up the legislative framework and the necessary regulations to change a system which hitherto celebrated corrupt and uncommitted public servants and politicians. The absence of sanctions, he noted, aids and abates a corrupt system coupled with the breakdown of law and order.

The President said he was confident that Nigerians had reached a consensus on the way forward in Nigeria. The decisions that have so far been taken by the populace, he said, were absolute respect for the rule of law, lack of tolerance for corruption, good governance and democracy. ” Culled 26/09/07.”

Does anyone remember the day Yar’Adua was sworn into office and the image beamed across the world with the captions proclaiming the event was being broadcast via the Nigerian satellite?

The above words were uttered by no less a personae than the silent, unseen and unheard ruler of Aso Rock shortly after the swearing in and well over a year ago when the platitudes and demagoguery was fast becoming the staple feed for the hungry Nigerian masses. They were meant to inform the unwary that indeed the new government meant business and was one with Nigerians.

Our President was no doubt very perceptive when he uttered that Nigerians had reached a consensus on the way forward in Nigeria, the rest of the mumbo-jumbo that were mouthed on that fateful day have been revealed to be what they were with the passing of time barely a year after! Abuse of office under the present dispensation has not been tackled; government has developed an outstanding respect for the ruse of law and a certain accommodation with well known corrupt elements that now call the shots as kingmakers in the Nigerian demonstration of craze. Good governance at all level in Nigeria remains a mirage and what is glaring is the hounding of those who dared to look at corruption in the face and the lack of any serious attempt at introducing legislation that would either challenge corruption and its exponents or even indicate a roadmap towards achieving any of the issues identified in the President’s 7-point Agenda. Perhaps more telling, but unnoticed at the time was the fact that our, “Yar’Adua spoke softly, slowly and made no facial expressions when he observed that Nigeria would have to make hard but necessary steps to reform the system “ That was the ultimate irony and joke; at the expense of Nigerians!

Sadly, the advent of Yar’Adua and troubadours has presented Nigerians with a feeling of waiting for something to happen – whatever it is nobody knows – and it feels like the lull between lightning and thunder. What remained a saving grace was the fact that a larger percentage of the Nigerian commonwealth was no longer being used to service external debts accrued to no avail and benefits by previous adventurers in power. This has enabled the building of a veritable war chest by the Nigerian government, not by design of purpose, but through the accident of a distorted global energy market demands that fuelled unbridled demand and rising prices for crude oil. This foreign exchange reserve has suddenly made our economy more attractive to investors because of its insular effects from the vagaries of the international market fluctuations and the naira has started to appreciate against weakening international currencies of trade. Government and politicians of the Nigerian breed simply reverted back to the Gowon-era mentality - when how to spend the “petro-naira” was the greatest challenge facing those in power – the moment our earnings from crude oil went through the roof. The issue for our politicians collectively became a matter of how the excess income was to be shared, not how to use this to diversify our economic base and prepare for a bust that was surely to come.

The bubble has indeed come to a pop and the earnings from crude oil have fallen lower than our politicians’ lower lips. Mind you, the prices will come back up and we will embark on yet more madness of spending. In the meantime, we have been intimated that our 43 billion naira pseudo-attempt at launching and manning communications satellites, courtesy of none other than the Chinese, has come to a sad, wasteful and disastrous end!

While it may be fashionable to point fingers of culpability or even accept that the mishap regarding our satellite failure may be just that – a mishap – I am amazed that no one, ostensibly, seems to be taking the responsibility for this colossal waste! There has been no resignations nor calls for one or more. Worse still, we hear about efforts to get another satellite into space – courtesy of the Chinese yet again! Hilariously, there has come a call to borrow – wait for it – an amount of money that amounts to a better part of how much we have in our foreign exchange reserve! And from the China Exim Bank, too.

It seems these Chinese have succeeded in casting a spell over the Nigerian government or have simply becoming willing and ready accomplices in siphoning our public funds on behalf of our unscrupulous officials! Either that or my name is Tawakalitu Tomboy Chukwuemeka Tamuno Marouf Oloriburuku which my parents did not name me!

So, I beg the questions, why borrow now, why that amount of money specifically, why the Chinese again, why another project aimed at possibly another misadventure that does not directly impact upon everyday Nigerians?

I would also like to know how the proposed borrowing and the funding of the NigComSat 2 and 3 advanced series are of relevance in addressing President Yar'Adua's 7-point Agenda, reproduced below:

  1. Tackling general insecurity to life and property.
  2. Tackling nation-wide shortage of energy and power.
  3. Alleviating mass poverty by wealth and employment creation.
  4. Providing qualitative, functional, and affordable education for the people.
  5. Improving mass transportation.
  6. Improving food security and agricultural production.
  7. Initiating a general land reform.

Perhaps, someone might be kind enough to elucidate me as I wonder what impact a fraction of this amount would have on our educational, health, infrastructural and technological development. The Chinese, earlier this year, successfully sent a manned exploration into space; with American stolen technology, it was loudly whispered. The operative word being “STOLEN”. Now you have to ask me, how do you trust a bedfellow with a reputation like that?

Frankly, ‘made in China’ used to be the buzz word for fake or inferior materials, goods or quality in Nigeria when we were growing up. It had a pride of place second only to the term ‘made in Aba’ for the same dubious reputation but methinks “Made in Aba” must now be made to take its pride of place if ‘made in China’ is now synonymous with quality in Nigeria. If need be, let us ‘steal’ technology and use it to enhance the value of ‘Made in Aba’ or if we are averse to aping our Chinese bedfellows, let us spend our Naira in empowering and encouraging various skilled Nigerians across the world to deliver for Nigeria rather than investing this on the Chinese.

I personally feel that the call by Professor Ahmed Rufai for the concessionary borrowing is mischievous and self-serving in the least and should be treated with some serious degree of levity as unpatriotic. Nigerians should roundly condemn this mad request and the crass opportunity for felon that it represents in these days when there are no direct gains to be made to the general populace from this misadventure. I would have felt a lot happier if this asinine professor had called for a fraction of this money to be spent on developing our own home grown or ‘stolen’ technology. If there is indeed a commercial imperative to this call, then let it be handled by the private sector as we have seen that the nascent sector in Nigeria is quite capable of dealing with fibre-optic technology in a far more superior manner to that of the government carrier! Simply put, let the demand meet the supply where necessary.

So where does all these concern our unseen and unheard President?

Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown, they say. With more than a quarter of the stolen mandate gone, Nigerians are yet to garner the precise direction of government; no enabling laws have been placed before, or passed, by the legislative chambers to either tackle the myriads of problems faced by Nigerians daily or to even start to address a focus on the President’s own agenda; the lack of deterrent to corruption is emboldening others who see a lackluster approach to taming the matter and as such allowing them to couch their perfidious ways in garbs of national interest; the President is yet to unshackle his government from the ‘arrangee’ agreements engendered by the manner of his coming to power and appointments are still based on the ‘settlement mentality’ rather than on merit.

So, for the sake of clarity, can I ask our President and his men to confirm if the Chinese cabal has now replaced the Vaswani cabal and if this ‘loan’ is taken – for which Nigerian benefit? If it is so, I shudder to think what amounts of money Nigeria would talk about as missing or misspent when the present occupier of the Aso Rock throne vacates the office.

Dear God, please protect us from our leaders.

 

 

 

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