President Buhari’s in. So, what next? (3)

Poverty is a complex web of cause and effect. Nigeria is a clear evidence that strong economic growth rates do not automatically translate to good human development for the majority. It is most shocking to see women working at construction sites carrying head pans so as to make ends meet. Nigeria ranks amongst the 25 poorest nations with the likes of Kenya, Ghana and Zambia and is home to more poor people than any other country on earth. Depending on the source and criteria for defining poverty, between 50 percent and 70 percent of our citizens are poor – up to 119 million people, majority of who live in rural areas. Mr. President, your administration requires unshakeable determination to end this scourge. We need to have more policy consistency, continuity and accountability. Projects need to be monitored closely and resources we have must be spent wisely on targeted objectives. We must not spread ourselves too thin.

Nigeria’s Vision 20:2020 has been the overarching ambition driving the implementation of former President Obasanjo’s National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS) and United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Former Presidents Jonathan and Yar’Adua deserve credit for connecting their respective government agendas to NEEDS. Will President Buhari do the same? We need to create an environment conducive to growth of jobs through entrepreneurship and expansion of existing businesses. The Federal Government’s “YouWin” project recorded some success and should be continued. In particular, through vocational marketable skills training leading to jobs such as babysitting, domestic maids, catering, waitressing, etc that can be formalised through certification, poor people will acquire and accumulate economic resources. Through this asset-building approach as propounded by the Ford Foundation, individuals and communities can begin to take control of their lives and effect change that breaks the yoke of poverty.

If Mr. President is able to successfully champion the cardinal role of government to preserve and nurture our vast natural assets for the common good, a meaningful take-off point for our teeming poor will be the scaling up of the current conditional cash transfers being rolled out in different parts of the country. Brazil has used Bolsa Familia to improve the economic and social wellbeing of millions of its people. Land asset through necessary regulatory reform must be leveraged for the benefit of the people living closest to it, for instance, through enhanced smallholder farming. Farm proceeds must ride on support infrastructure so that farmers derive the most benefit from the market economy which, as the cycle repeats itself, gradually elevates people to a stronger state of wellbeing.

The Federal Government has since 2007 implemented the Care of the People Conditional Cash Transfer with a view to eradicating extreme poverty and hunger. The scheme as at 2013 covered a modest 330,000 persons in 12 states. It is universally agreed that over-dependency and a ballooning social security bill are dangerous and must be guarded against. We must make sure that social assistance is part and parcel of an integrated programme that will ultimately see such cash transfers gradually fall away to zero or near it.

Federal or state demand-driven certification of skills of artisans before they gain their “freedom” coupled with cash transfers to facilitate business start-ups will have a direct impact on improving the fortunes of our rural and semi-urban poor families. Enhanced smallholder agriculture (the Babban Gona Farmers Organisation in Kaduna is a successful model) and light manufacturing by new and growing businesses are also key policy intervention areas that will have far-reaching impact on the lives of Nigeria’s poor. Climate Change should also be taken more seriously as it has potential to aggravate Nigeria’s food insecurity as well as endanger lives and property.

We are the largest producer of cassava, yam and cowpea and also a major producer of fish. We can and should cut down on our imports so we can channel the foreign exchange to productive capital investments that we require. We must fully optimise our 71 million hectares of arable land through irrigation and other inputs with a view to increasing crop yields. From a trade policy standpoint, similar to China’s emergence, it is worth promoting exports from Nigeria while being highly selective on imports. One of Nigeria’s strong cultural values is entrepreneurship, especially in South-East Nigeria. This is a great asset that we need to leverage by all means necessary for monetisation of the internal market as well as creation of an export hub.      

Drivers, security guards, housemaids, artisans and other informal sector or causal workers require legal protection (including enforcement of existing labour laws, rules and regulations) from exploitation arising from low wages and poor working conditions. Social protection promotes social cohesion and allows every citizen know and feel like she or he has a direct stake in Nigeria’s progress. I recall overhearing, during the Lagos barracks bomb blasts of 2001, a group of socially excluded people thinking there may have been a coup or social uprising, alluding to how it is best for the whole country to collapse and then everyone will be at the same level and then rebuilding will start from zero!

Our import-dependency is crippling our economy, especially because the sole source for paying for those imports is oil proceeds. This is a central economic theme that we all agree needs to be addressed. The good news is that we are very, very slowly retuning our appetite to consumption of local goods and services away from foreign ones. Perhaps a way to accelerate the process is to religiously celebrate our emerging local brands across all sectors. In order to fix Nigeria, we cannot continue to be fatalist. We need to do the work across all levels and put our successful models forward for replication and accumulation.

Mayowa Amoo