The New Price Of Oil And The Looming Darkness By Patrick Naagbanton

Okonjo-Iweala’s wand amidst the gloom is
not sustainable. The time has come to face the
challenges in a very pragmatic way. Nigeria
is a secular state. Governments at all levels
should stop wasting public funds on promoting
religion and its related activities like
sponsoring people to pilgrimage either to
Jerusalem, Mecca or elsewhere. It is
unconstitutional. It contradicts the secular
spirits of the state. Monies wasted on that
annually can take care of security, health, job
creation and others that require urgent
attention.

Like the absurd Fuji House of Commotion, the
rulers of the Nigerian State responded by
withdrawing monies saved in the Excess Crude
Account while the Central Bank started selling our
foreign currency reserve in different currencies to
keep the Naira from collapsing. Dr. Ngozi
Okonjo-Iweala, Nigeria’s Finance Minister and
the Coordinating Minster of the Economy was
quoted to have said on Sunday, 16 November, 2014
that some of her government’s strategies are to
reduce the budget in the coming year (2015). She
also said hat she would impose harsh rules on
foreign travel and other spending by the government.
They would also raise taxes on luxury goods such
as cars, jets, and champagne. Nigeria depends
essentially on the proceeds of crude oil sales, and the
government is still battling hard to produce the
expected over 2 million barrels per day to be sold in
the international crude oil market for her usual
survival.
The bulk of the crude oil production comes from the
Niger Delta region, where organized illegal oil
bunkering and theft are tremendously affecting our
expected production quota. In the fossil fuel
category, the country has since abandoned the coal
pits in the Enugu axis of the south-eastern part of
the country for the sweet black gold (crude oil).
Sadly, Nigeria has slumped into the ‘fourth world’
because of her capacious and vicious mono-
economy status. Ifeoma Okoye, the celebrated
Enugu-based novelist and short story writer
popularised the concept of the fourth world in her
novel, The Fourth World, published in 2013. As a
fourth world country, we do not have the
technology to sell to earn any income and life for the
generality of our people is still wretched and
horrible.
In the same way crude oil theft and illegal
bunkering are rampant in the country, so is illegal
logging. Nigeria is one of the hotbeds of illegal
logging in the West African sub-region. The
situation presents a hopeless picture. Okonjo-
Iweala has told us in clear terms about the
austerity measures amidst the meltdown. Danger,
fear, anxiety and tragedy hang in our firmament.
Nigerians are among the few set of people globally
who love to live fake, corrupt and very luxurious
and obscene lifestyles – their forbiddingly expensive
bombardier jets, cars, houses, jewelry, phones,
clothes, etc. are now common global trademarks.
Austerity is here again, but how can it be managed
positively? That is the issue begging for dissection.
The crisis is deepening and already manifesting-
some workers have embarked on strike actions
because governments at all levels (federal, state and
local) no longer have monies to pay their salaries,
arrears and allowances. Just last week, the
governor of Benue State, one of the north-central
states, informed us that ‘by next year most states
will collapse economically and otherwise because
they will not be able to carry out their basic
responsibilities, like payment of worker’ salaries,
because of the nose-diving international crude oil
prices.’ Government projects and other initiatives
have been abandoned and more will be abandoned
because of lack of funds.
Apart from the looming economic crisis, there is
also population crisis – the Malthusian nightmare is
unfolding in the country, no matter one’s status, a
family does not need more than one or two children
currently, because of the dysfunctional Nigerian
economy, driven by the casino supported by
globalisation. Travelling around Nigerian
communities’ on daily basis, one sees teaming armies
of women, men, children and young people moving
everywhere like tidal river flow in their fierce and
desperate struggles for survival. Armed violence
and organized crime are on the increase because of
the weak and unprofessional responses from ill-
trained and poorly remunerated security personnel
scattered into the numerous security agencies with
overlapping functions. Religious bigotry and
extremism, hopelessness, and despondency are on the
rise, and these vices will all increase geometrically
as crude oil prices fall in the international market.
Okonjo-Iweala’s wand amidst the gloom is not
sustainable. The time has come to face the challenges
in a very pragmatic way. Nigeria is a secular
state. Governments at all levels should stop wasting
public funds on promoting religion and its related
activities like sponsoring people to pilgrimage either
to Jerusalem, Mecca or elsewhere. It is
unconstitutional. It contradicts the secular spirits
and letters of the state. Monies wasted on that
annually can take care of security, health, job
creation and others that require urgent attention.
The government must be serious about fighting
corruption and punishing offenders accordingly.
Monies and properties of those who have stolen
public funds should be confiscated and use in a
transparent manner to run the state.
The government must drastically cut down on its
spending. Some legislative and executive functions
of government must be run on a part-time basis—
the person participating should earn a moderate
allowance not salary. Any state or local
government, even federal agencies that prove to be
economically unviable and unproductive should be
scrapped. Wealthy citizens must be made to pay
real taxes and should see evidence of their tax
money transparently used by government. Citizens
must be made to have confidence in the system,
because if they lose confidence anarchy would be the
consequence. We all still remember the recent Arab
spring.
In this seemingly complex situation, I often have
times heard Christians – most Pentecostal church
devotees, chanting the mantra, “it is well". Such a
self-defeatist, self-deluding slogan is not the
solution now that the hardship looms larger than
life. This is not the time for a joke; it is time to put
up viable responses and not these peripheral and
phony ones to tame the looming darkness about to
consume us. It is not well.
Naagbanton lives in Port Harcourt, Rivers State
capital.

Credits:SaharaReporters