With about 20 plus days to the much-awaited
inauguration of Buhari and Osinbajo respectively
as President and Vice-President of the Federal
Republic of Nigeria, given the current realities of
Nigeria’s economy, there is growing debate in
various circles over what this might mean for
business. Will the next four years be a time of
real growth buoyed by change or will this be a
time of stagnation or, God forbid, decay? What
impact can the change agenda have on the
fortunes of the private sector – can the Phoenix
rise from the ashes; can Nigeria obtain a new
life by arising from the ashes of the Goodluck
Ebele Jonathan administration? The short cop
out of an answer is, “it depends


According to World Economic Forum 2014-2015
Global Competitiveness Report, there are some
problematic issues holding Nigeria back from
more inclusive growth including: the need to
deal decisively with corruption, insecurity and
crime; the need to fix institutions urgently (such
as its Criminal Justice System); the need to
diversify government revenue sources and
improve taxation; the need to improve access to
finance and fix ailing infrastructure (such as
power supply); the need to reform inefficient
government bureaucracy and a poor work ethic,
to name a few items. Fixing these issues would
provide the environment for growth and yes, the
APC manifesto addresses nigh on all of these
issues, but are there indications that these are
things a Buhari Presidency will in actual fact do?

Buhari has mentioned in a number of media
interviews that his priority will be security,
economy, unemployment and corruption,
however these statements are currently lacking
in details. Will the incoming APC administration
try to do too much too soon in response to the
huge expectations and if so, would they run the
risk of a certain level of policy inconsistency or
even reversals?

Stagnation or decay could be the result if the
incoming administration fails to take the hard
decisions needed for change. The wrong signals
could also be sent if the same old corrupt
politicians are re-cycled into the Buhari
administration, then businesses would fear that
perhaps we are not in line for change after all.

The 19-man transition committee was met with
mixed reactions but it is perhaps better to hold
off from making hasty conclusions till the shape
of the starting line-up of Ministers is known.

More important than perceptions is the fear in
some business quarters that Buhari may end up
“over-delegating”. Those who push this viewpoint
cite the “fact” that his team members have
always been given room to do the work – not a
bad thing at all in and of itself, but they fear if
political “hawks” find room in his government, it
will ultimately lead to an erosion of his power
and allow wrongdoing to be perpetrated right
under his nose – you only need to see parallels
with the Brazilian situation. They expect he
would then move to deal with it but it will not
be without a loss of credibility in the public eye.

Some also fear that if the administration is not
strategic in prioritising what to take on and fix,
then it could take on issues that erode its
momentum and distract it from the change we
seek. Failure to deal with the fissures in Nigerian
society would also eventually mean that the
administration would rapidly erode the enormous
goodwill that brought it to power.

So, what is the absolute minimum needed for
growth and, therefore, the set of issues that the
new administration must prioritise? If the
antecedence of the APC is anything to go by,
fixing the Criminal Justice System and improving
Tax Administration are two things one would
expect to be high on the agenda. If the...

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