Last December, I wrote in a column entitled Goodbye 2018: The next will be rockier for the world (BusinessDay, 31 December 2018): “The outgoing year, 2018, has been challenging, but it’s presaging a rockier one for Nigeria and the world”. So, looking back, as 2019 ends this week, how has it gone for Nigeria?
Well, let’s start with politics. After all, the main event this year was the general election, of which the two main parties were All Progressives Congress, APC, and People’s Democratic Party, PDP, with President Muhammadu Buhari and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar as their respective presidential candidates.
As I predicted, the election was shaped by perceptions of personal integrity rather than competence. Buhari was perceived by most ordinary Nigerians to be incorruptible, while Atiku, despite having the best policies and being a far more competent candidate, struggled under a burden of negative perceptions! It was a contest between a pious, anti-free market demagogue and a brash, pro-market liberal. The former won!
That said, there were significant irregularities, which though did not materially affect the outcome of the election, but nevertheless undermined its credibility. The turnout in the presidential election was, at 35%, about the lowest of recent presidential elections in Nigeria, with only 27m people voting, even though 82m actually collected the permanent voter cards, PVCs. The unpopularity of both leading candidates was a key factor. For instance, while the North voted massively, and for Buhari, the turnout in the South, where Buhari was less popular and Atiku was viewed with suspicion, fell below 25%.
But the presidential election and the subsequent governorship polls were also marred by militarisation, violence, voter-intimidation and massive vote-buying. President Buhari’s removal of the Chief Justice of Nigeria in the middle of the presidential election campaign sent a negative signal of abuse of incumbency. As the European Union Election Observer Mission (EOM) said in its final report, “Instances of the misuse of state resources and vote-buying were evident and remained generally unaddressed.” Truth is, the conduct of this year’s election, which fell far short of that of 2015, was a really low point of 2019.
Well, another low point was the reckless neglect and deliberate harming of the economy. Since President Buhari’s re-election this year, he has done nothing to boost economic efficiency. He started his second term with a bloated cabinet of 43 ministers, made up wholly of loyal associates, campaign hacks and party apologists, none with a reputation for economic technocracy. He tried to make up for that by constituting, on September 16, a high-profile Presidential Economic Advisory Council. But, as I have written twice in this column, there is no evidence that the economic technocrats have been giving Buhari the right policy advice or, if they have, that he has heeded their advice. Think of the economic and social self-harm of closing Nigeria’s land borders. “All goods, for now, are banned from being exported or imported through our land borders”, the government said in October!
It is very interesting that the Buhari government is doing everything to dampen economic activities and yet complaining about low tax revenues. In August, the presidency ordered the chairman of the federal inland revenue service (FIRS), Tunde Fowler, to explain “the significant variances between budgeted tax collection and actual tax collection”. Fowler sensibly explained that “tax revenue collection is a function of economic activities”. But Buhari was not satisfied and on December 9 removed Fowler from office, citing low revenue earnings! Yet, the main problem was not FIRS’ failure to collect taxes, but the government’s inability to generate sufficient economic activities and growth to increase revenue earnings.
The reckless management of the economy is a key low point of 2019; a recklessness that manifested in the shoddy handling of the Process and Industrial Development (P&ID) case, which resulted in a judgement debt of $9.6bn being upheld against Nigeria by an English commercial court in August this year
But President Buhari’s economic policies were not only hampering revenue generation, it was also increasing extreme poverty in Nigeria. For a start, policies such as food-import ban and border closure would only increase the prices of consumer goods in the country, which would increase the cost of living. In a country where nearly half of the population live in extreme poverty and where there is no general income support and social safety net, such policies would certainly increase extreme poverty. What’s more, in December, the World Bank warned that the number of Nigerians living in extreme poverty would increase by 30 million by 2030, with Nigeria then accounting for 25% of the world’s extreme poor population, if it did not urgently undertake far-reaching economic reforms. Indeed, with Nigeria’s population projected to reach 397 million by 2050, according to the UN, the country faces a poverty ticking time bomb without radical reforms and rapid growth!
Surely, one key impetus for embarking on such structural reforms is the African Continental Free Trade Area, AfCFTA, which, if positively embraced, could lead to the transformation of Nigeria’s productive and export capacities and attract significant foreign investment into the country. Sadly, Nigeria sees AfCFTA as a threat rather than an opportunity!
Since reluctantly signing the AfCFTA agreement in July this year, President Buhari has done nothing to start the process of its ratification in the National Assembly. Rather, he recently inaugurated the National Action Committee to ensure that AfCFTA “reflects Nigeria’s national trade objectives and development plans”, which are protectionist as both the “objectives” and “plans” are based on import-substitution, and not export-orientation. Thus, its approach to AfCFTA has been to set up one committee after another without actually taking concrete steps towards implementation. But that shows a lack of readiness to embark on the kind of radical structural economic reforms that the country badly needs.
So, the reckless management of the economy is a key low point of 2019; a recklessness that manifested in the shoddy handling of the Process and Industrial Development (P&ID) case, which resulted in a judgement debt of $9.6bn being upheld against Nigeria by an English commercial court in August this year. Although Nigeria has appealed the judgement, the country is at the mercy of the English court, with interests accumulating on the debt!
From politics and the economy, let’s move on to social cohesion and the rule of law. Well, there have been low points too! The rampant killings of innocent farmers by Fulani herdsmen, and President Buhari’s insensitive attempt to appease the herdsmen by establishing cattle colonies or so-called rural grazing areas, RUGA, in the South and the Middle Belt were terrible events that could have inflamed ethnic tensions in 2019.
Equally provocative was the obnoxious attempt by some federal legislators to introduce the so-called hate speech and social medial laws under which any Nigerian found guilty of making hate speech could be sentenced to death by hanging! Equally obnoxious was the attempt by some APC legislators in the National Assembly to amend the Constitution to allow President Buhari run for a third term. Another Third Term agenda? It’s beyond belief!
Ah, what about President Buhari’s utter disregard for the rule of law? The arrest and trial of the activist Omoyele Sowore for treason simply for shouting “Revolution Now”, the disobedience of court orders to release him from detention and, shockingly, the invasion of a court by security operatives to forcefully re-arrest him were terrible blows to human rights and the rule of law. It was a very low point that Buhari had to be forced by local agitation and US super-power pressure before releasing Sowore and Sambo Dasuki on December 24.
So, 2019 is full of low points for Nigeria. But I can’t end this piece without adding another low point: the death on September 22 of Ambassador Chiedu Osakwe, Nigeria’s and AfCFTA’s chief trade negotiator. It was a terrible loss!
Happy New Year everyone. May 2020 bring lots of high points!
