One of the most frequent charges leveled against me is that I am a pessimist.
I have two simple answers to that charge: I often say, “Look, we have tens of millions of optimistic Nigerians. I think it is proper that we have a few pessimists so that we don’t miss things that are on our blind spot.”
One of the most frequent charges leveled against me is that I am a pessimist.
I have two simple answers to that charge: I often say, “Look, we have tens of millions of optimistic Nigerians. I think it is proper that we have a few pessimists so that we don’t miss things that are on our blind spot.”
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The other answer I give is for those who think that being a pessimist is the same as being an anarchist. To them, I say, “With all the sycophants loitering around corridors of power in Nigeria, we should be glad we have a few pessimists who shine the light on the realities the sycophants miss.”
Beyond all these cosmetics, certain things seriously bother me. Maybe they bother you too. For me, they are part of the reasons why I find it hard to be optimistic.
Let us look at a few examples.
When the government of President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2004 offered Prof. Chinua Achebe a National Honor, he rejected it. He issued a statement stating why. My assumption is that if another government wants to offer a National Honor to Prof. Achebe, it will first reach out to him before publishing his name as a recipient. Even if the protocol does not provide for such outreach, my guess is that the government will first send out feelers to know how Prof. Achebe may react.
But that did not happen. President Jonathan’s government simply added his name on the list of recipients. Even when the list was published, nobody tried to reach Achebe. The novelist obviously did not call the government to express his gratitude. It was when Saharareporters reported that Prof. Achebe might reject the honor that government officials started to run around to find a way to reach Prof. Achebe. Believe me, they did not have Prof. Achebe’s phone number in Abuja and they did not have it at our embassy in Washington. They did not even know one person to call to obtain the number.
I know that a typical Nigerian will accept any honor, with any batch of recipients, from any president. But Achebe has proven that he is not your typical Nigerian. If I were the President, before I approve the list, I would have asked the question, “Did anyone reach out to Achebe? Do we know if he will accept it?”
If not for anything else, I won’t want Prof. Achebe to embarrass me with a rejection.
But that is not how the people who run the affairs of Nigeria think. That’s, if they think at all.
My suspicion is that our leaders spend more time thinking of how to steal money and how to hide it that they do not have the time for basic rational thought.
Still on the president, last week at the 17th Nigerian Economic Summit, he warned Nigerians that if we do not allow him to remove oil subsidy, we risk importing fuel from Ghana in ten years time. Really? Are we supposed to be scared of that possibility? Didn’t we recently read that Nigerian students in Ghana spend 155 billion naira each year to go to school there while our government spends 121 billion for Nigeria’s Federal Universities each year? Never mind how much Nigerian students spend in Ukraine.
President Jonathan’s scare tactics is that we will be importing fuel from Ghana because we failed to remove the oil subsidy. I know the economic jargon they often throw around to explain it. Investors will not come into Nigeria to invest in our downstream sector because the PMS price at the pump is lower than the cost of production. How did countries like Libya, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait etc where the PMS price at the pump is lower than the cost of production get their investors?
You may have noticed that they have stopped saying that why we need to remove fuel subsidy is because fuel is more expensive in countries that bordered Nigeria and as a result, our marketers smuggle fuel meant for Nigeria to our neighbors.
Someone should tell the president that we look forward to importing from Ghana because, considering transportation cost, it will be cheaper for us than importing from Venezuela or Indonesia.
Has anyone in government explained to you what happened to our refineries? Do you remember the millions of dollars Obasanjo’s government gave to Emeka Ofor and his likes in the name of rehabilitating our refineries? At one point, they simply gave two of the refineries away to their friends in business. These are the same friends of every government-in-power who own oil blocks.
So these business geniuses tap our oil for free. They own the refineries they got virtually for free. Now they want the government to make sure that Nigerians pay for petrol at the same price that Americans pay. Otherwise, they won’t refine. You do not hear them screaming that Nigerians must be paid the minimum wage that Americans workers get paid($1200 a month). In fact, the governors are refusing to pay the N18,000 ($120) a month the federal government agreed to pay in their negotiations with the Nigerian Labor Union.
When you hear the likes of Emeka Anyaoku tell you that subsidy must go, he won’t tell you in the same statement that his refinery, coming on line next year, is poised to benefit from it.
Also last week, President Jonathan told Nigerians that Boko Haram would fade away. That is better than saying that it is our time to be attacked and in case you are wondering, terrorism is no big deal because it is a global thing.
But when you think about it, you remember that about ten years ago, then President Obasanjo assured Nigerians that Sharia would fade away. Over 10,000 deaths after, Sharia faded away, alright.
But it was quickly replaced by Boko Haram.
When would President Jonathan’s pledge that Boko Haram would fade away happen? How many deaths would it take? And what would come after Boko Haram?
These are questions that potential investors will be asking themselves. But what did President Jonathan offer to concerned investors? He said, “The security issues will soon pass. People even invest in countries in civil war. Anybody who doesn’t want to invest now will regret it later.”
Wow! That will make any investor to catch the next flight to Nigeria.
Meanwhile, the two ministers the president was counting on to push his agenda, Prof. Bart Nnaji of Power and Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala of Finance were busy in Enugu attending a conference on how to bring about Igbo presidency in 2015.
It is easy to see why Prof. Bart Nnaji will think that way. If he provides 24-hour a day of electricity to Lagos and Abuja, Nigerians would call him a hero and elect him president. As for Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, her calculation is that once oil subsidy is removed and she builds the 2nd Niger Bridge, she will ride on the back of that achievement to be president.
Forgive me if I fail to be optimistic. My heart is fragile. It cannot survive any more heartbreak. My heart does well with pleasant surprises. And that is what happens when a pessimist is proven wrong.
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