Nigeria’s hazardous cracks

This is the synopsis of Nigeria so far this year: Botched February 28 general elections that left both the international community and the country’s citizens dumbfounded; the two leading political parties, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC) locked in bruising campaign rhetoric that is gradually flaming contagious crisis; A plethora of dubious legal battles against party candidates and most intriguingly, against the new March 28 date for the election-legal cases as trivial and stupid as that against the use of the permanent voters card (PVCs) and card readers; legal lies about the ‘missing’$20 billion NNPC money and then an economy in oil recession and ministers in denial of their failure to manage the natural wealth of the country equitably: the cracks, too numerous, are dubiously joined and very dangerous, but this is Nigeria and this is 2015, the election year, the year predicted for the almighty ‘break-up.’

Curiously, you can naturally feel and see how hard we are all working towards that break-up goal. It’s as if we all signed up to tear up bits of the pie for ourselves and, in a ‘rumble manner’ too.  The past few weeks has seen all of these cracks intensify and widen, revealing how much we are prepared to accomplish. All of that too is reflected in our countenance and the way and extent we are prepared to stay the course of extremes.

All of the cracks incidentally have very different roots. But as the days and weeks sweeps bye, they worsen, and they are all beginning to voraciously feed on each other.

The postponed elections heightened doubts about the credibility of the Independent National Election Commission (INEC) and the potential manipulation of the out come of the results of the elections. The sense of doubt is encouraged by the plethora of court cases seeking to scuttle the elections. This also raises all manner of questions around the complicity of the Presidency in ‘this thick’ plot to scuttle Nigeria’s nascent democracy-as predicted and the existence of the country in its current structure.

Thankfully, there are only a few, remote cases of blood sacrifices so far, as the political landscape remains uncertain of its next direction.

The slumping economy against the backdrop of dipping oil revenues and crude oil prices sends dire signals as well. ‘Minority’ report on the level of official corruption has blanked every government pontification on the resourcefulness of the economy-the violently gyrating currency, the Naira, has not helped issues. Amazingly, the failings in the response to the sources of the pull and pressure on the currency, as obvious as it is, is alarming as the failings in the response to the security challenges in the Northern parts of the country.

The clamour to further devalue the currency is growing both within and outside the country. But the Central Bank (CBN) seems not all disposed towards such measures, which will clearly portray the governor, Godwin Emefiele, as the worst the country ever had if he attempts to.

The signs of desperation of the economy manifested at the January edition of the Federal Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) meeting after revenues fell almost 16 percent to N416.1 billion as against December 2014 revenues of N490 billion.

The intensification of the pressure on the currency presents the country, particularly the manufacturing sector with stark choices. Growth in the sector slowed to 19. 2 percent on electricity sector woes and high input cost in the third quarter of 2014.

Meanwhile, every other important decision waits. Companies are ‘dulling’ on decisions on investments and revenues, and at the same time they are taking a battering on the expenditure side. Across sectors, expect bloodied books by the end of this quarter-which incidentally will reflect on year-end performance.

I have been searching for vital signs that could suggest some form of intense attention to the cracks and signs too of return to normalcy pronto, after the March 28 and April 11 elections. At least, the behavior of the economy, drained by dwindling oil revenue and external reserves, the eccentricity of the political class, which is growing, not diminishing, makes it distinctly not possible.

Charles Ike-Okoh