GboyegaD:

You need to go learn how to understand and interprete data. Who told you Nigeria is doing better than most countries in real terms? I wonder why we either don't know and try to feign we know more than others or we know and pretend to lie under falsehood? It is either you know the truth and you are trying to manipulate it or you don't know and you are trying to pretend you know.

Clemzy16: ...and some people would still say military form of govt is evil. Was this 70s and 80s not the same era that military was in governmental power?! I know coup has its own dis-advantages. But my question is.. What have we achieved so far with democracy?! Simple: Corruption et al.. That is why we have the ExecuTHIEVES, LegisLOOTERS and JudiSHARING. They thief, loot and share.

donniemc:

Idiot...Nigeria is the 3rd fastest growing economy in the world!!...that means only 2 countries in the world are doing
better than Nigeria economically..it is you that should learn how to google before you post

solomonkane:

And what beer parlour did you get this statistic from? See the link below for the IMF's index of the 20 fastest growing economies as at October 24, 2012 and stop displaying extravagant idiocy.

http://www.businessinsider.com/worlds-fastest-economies-2012-10?op=1

afam4eva: Who do we blame? Babangida?

donniemc: Idiot...Nigeria is the 3rd fastest growing economy in the world!!...that means only 2 countries in the world are doing better than Nigeria economically..it is you that should learn how to google before you post

Sam Milla: Apparently the militia mallams destroyed this country.
Buhari was one of them and he is still running for president today.

thelastPope: Precisely around when Buhari took over. go figure

solomonkane:

And what beer parlour did you get this statistic from? See the link below for the IMF's index of the 20 fastest growing economies as at October 24, 2012 and stop displaying extravagant idiocy.

http://www.businessinsider.com/worlds-fastest-economies-2012-10?op=1

afam4eva: Who do we blame? Babangida?

naptu2: Serious oil exploration began in the 1970s (the Gowon era), around the time when the arab-israeli crisis was at its height. This meant that we had record high oil prices. Nigeria made a lot of money. Unfortunately, we also spent a lot of money.

People were being employed into the civil service to do jobs that did not add any value to the economy. As soon as you graduated you could easily get a job in the civil service, with a car and official house in Ikoyi (and later Festac and Satellite towns). The government took over lots of private companies (Daily Times, etc) and sunk money into them. We did not save for the rainy day. Instead of diversifying, the government was taking over profitable private companies and running them down such that, by the end of the 1970s, we were running a mono-economy (oil accounted for almost 90% of revenue).

In the early '80s the US ensured that the price of oil fell. The encouraged Saudi Arabia to flood the market with oil. They also encouraged peace treaties between Israel and Egypt, Israel and Jordan, etc.

The economy first showed signs of trouble around 1982. The price of oil (which provided about 90% of revenue) collapsed. The government introduced austerity measures. Some food items disappeared from breakfast and dinner tables. People started complaining (thinking about it now, we never knew how bad things would be later on). The 1983 elections+the economic problems led to the fall of Shagari's government (it didn't help that politicians were throwing lavish parties at 1004, importing prostitutes and buying long wheel base limousines).

Buhari came in and tried to stabilise the economy by force. Companies were made to advertise retail prices of their products. Soldiers went into the markets to enforce such prices (for example, if lever brothers advertises a retail price of 30k for lux soap and a trader is seen selling it above 30k, the soldiers would seize his goods and distribute them to the public for free). They changed the currency overnight, so that politicians couldn't take stolen money abroad. They also placed limits on overseas trips and the amount of money you could take out of the country. Buhari refused to take the IMF loan and accept their conditions because the government felt that it would impinge on our sovereignty. Some of these measures worked, while some failed.

Babangida came in and implemented SAP (probably the most hated government policy ever). People might want to kill me when I say that the SAP idea was not a bad idea theoretically. The fact is, it's not, but it was definitely not suitable for Nigeria of 1986. The idea was that the government should ban imports, encourage local industries and devalue the currency so that our exports would be cheaper.

The reality was that the government had taken over most of the major private firms, such that we didn't have indigenous private companies to take advantage of this policy. We had government companies and foreign companies.

Nigerians depended on imports. We went to the big department stores to buy cheap easily affordable/available imported goods. Even the poorest civil servant could afford these luxuries. SAP put these goods beyond the reach of most Nigerians.

The naira was suddenly and radically devalued (I remember Punch Newspaper's cartoon of the naira in a boxing ring, being knocked out by the dollar). The kobo became absolutely useless. People learnt a new form of arithmetic, I.e the 1-0-1, 0-1-0, 0-0-1, etc (breakfast, no lunch, dinner; no breakfast, lunch, no dinner). I think one of the biggest and most wide spread riots in Nigeria must have been the SAP riots of 1988. People were fed up! They almost got to Dodan Barracks!

Manufacturing companies closed down because they couldn't get cheap imported raw materials. The big department stores closed down because they couldn't afford to stock imported goods (the fall in the value of the naira meant that the masses couldn't afford the goods). Nigeria experienced de-industrialisation (Berec Batteries, Volkswagen of Nigeria and many other factories closed down).

Our value system also collapsed. Corruption became the rule, rather than the exception. There was no shame in it anymore. Honesty was seen as a sign of stupidity.

Things have improved since the return to civilian rule, but they have not improved fast enough and sometimes it seems we lack direction. We now have Nigerian brands that can take advantage of a SAP (Glo, Silverbird, Oando, AIT, etc), but the corruption, abuse of office and violence of the second republic has returned. Nigerians are disillusioned. People we're once very proud to be Nigerians. That pride is absent now.

(70's And 80's : Nigeria Was Among The Top 20 Choice Destinations)

sleekymag: This shows Obasanjo's time was a good time (1976 - 1979). Buhari's truncation of the new democracy after Obasanjo handed over to Shagari may have turned the tide. Moreover that's the period when the naira started depreciating against the dollar, and pound.

donniemc:
Dude you have no idea what Nigeria has become!!...Nigeria is one of the Most economically stable countries in the world.....if you dnt Know much about a subject do yourself a fovour and Shut d f**k up...you can fault Nigeria in many aspects but when it comes to the economy we doing very fine..even better than most countries in Europe...and btw most white folks i know are making serious plans of migrating to Nigeria or cape town in 2013.....its just a pity ignorance is BLISS on nairaland

donniemc:
Dude you have no idea what Nigeria has become!!...Nigeria is one of the Most economically stable countries in the world.....if you dnt Know much about a subject do yourself a fovour and Shut d f**k up...you can fault Nigeria in many aspects but when it comes to the economy we doing very fine..even better than most countries in Europe...and btw most white folks i know are making serious plans of migrating to Nigeria or cape town in 2013.....its just a pity ignorance is BLISS on nairaland

naptu2:
Serious oil exploration began in the 1970s (the Gowon era), around the time when the arab-israeli crisis was at its height. This meant that we had record high oil prices. Nigeria made a lot of money. Unfortunately, we also spent a lot of money.

People were being employed into the civil service to do jobs that did not add any value to the economy. As soon as you graduated you could easily get a job in the civil service, with a car and official house in Ikoyi (and later Festac and Satellite towns). The government took over lots of private companies (Daily Times, etc) and sunk money into them. We did not save for the rainy day. Instead of diversifying, the government was taking over profitable private companies and running them down such that, by the end of the 1970s, we were running a mono-economy (oil accounted for almost 90% of revenue).

In the early '80s the US ensured that the price of oil fell. The encouraged Saudi Arabia to flood the market with oil. They also encouraged peace treaties between Israel and Egypt, Israel and Jordan, etc.

The economy first showed signs of trouble around 1982. The price of oil (which provided about 90% of revenue) collapsed. The government introduced austerity measures. Some food items disappeared from breakfast and dinner tables. People started complaining (thinking about it now, we never knew how bad things would be later on). The 1983 elections+the economic problems led to the fall of Shagari's government (it didn't help that politicians were throwing lavish parties at 1004, importing prostitutes and buying long wheel base limousines).

Buhari came in and tried to stabilise the economy by force. Companies were made to advertise retail prices of their products. Soldiers went into the markets to enforce such prices (for example, if lever brothers advertises a retail price of 30k for lux soap and a trader is seen selling it above 30k, the soldiers would seize his goods and distribute them to the public for free). They changed the currency overnight, so that politicians couldn't take stolen money abroad. They also placed limits on overseas trips and the amount of money you could take out of the country. Buhari refused to take the IMF loan and accept their conditions because the government felt that it would impinge on our sovereignty. Some of these measures worked, while some failed.

Babangida came in and implemented SAP (probably the most hated government policy ever). People might want to kill me when I say that the SAP idea was not a bad idea theoretically. The fact is, it's not, but it was definitely not suitable for Nigeria of 1986. The idea was that the government should ban imports, encourage local industries and devalue the currency so that our exports would be cheaper.

The reality was that the government had taken over most of the major private firms, such that we didn't have indigenous private companies to take advantage of this policy. We had government companies and foreign companies.

Nigerians depended on imports. We went to the big department stores to buy cheap easily affordable/available imported goods. Even the poorest civil servant could afford these luxuries. SAP put these goods beyond the reach of most Nigerians.

The naira was suddenly and radically devalued (I remember Punch Newspaper's cartoon of the naira in a boxing ring, being knocked out by the dollar). The kobo became absolutely useless. People learnt a new form of arithmetic, I.e the 1-0-1, 0-1-0, 0-0-1, etc (breakfast, no lunch, dinner; no breakfast, lunch, no dinner). I think one of the biggest and most wide spread riots in Nigeria must have been the SAP riots of 1988. People were fed up! They almost got to Dodan Barracks!

Manufacturing companies closed down because they couldn't get cheap imported raw materials. The big department stores closed down because they couldn't afford to stock imported goods (the fall in the value of the naira meant that the masses couldn't afford the goods). Nigeria experienced de-industrialisation (Berec Batteries, Volkswagen of Nigeria and many other factories closed down).

Our value system also collapsed. Corruption became the rule, rather than the exception. There was no shame in it anymore. Honesty was seen as a sign of stupidity.

Things have improved since the return to civilian rule, but they have not improved fast enough and sometimes it seems we lack direction. We now have Nigerian brands that can take advantage of a SAP (Glo, Silverbird, Oando, AIT, etc), but the corruption, abuse of office and violence of the second republic has returned. Nigerians are disillusioned. People we're once very proud to be Nigerians. That pride is absent now.

Nauttyprof:
I think what we should all do is try and suggest the possible solutions to our problems maybe one way or the other, someone somewhere might read and take a step in creating a change in his own might. Nigeria should be better and not the other way.