Presidential candidate of the Abundant Nigeria Renewal Party (ANRP) for the 2019 election, Mr. Tope Fasua, speaks about a better Nigeria with passion. His campaign dubbed the revolution of ideas saw him traversing 33 states.

While many backed the COVID-19 lockdown ordered by President Muhammadu Buhari and governors in affected states, Fasua, an economist and businessman, strongly advocated for a reopening of economy, saying Nigerians many of whom operate in the informal should return to work to keep the country afloat.

In this interview with KEMI YESUFU, he speaks on the way out of the many challenges Nigeria’s faces, advising that the Federal Government invest in a foundation of human capital development. Fasua an author of six books also believes the global COVID-19 lockdown, which saw oil prices crash to an unprecedented low, leaving Nigeria’s economy in dire straits presents an opportunity for the actual restructuring the country needs.



You canvassed the reopening of the economy after weeks of the COVID-19 lockdown. Do you stand by your call, seeing the chaos that followed the first two to three days of the reopening, as well as the number of new cases of the disease on a daily basis?

I don’t know what will happen to change my position. But for now, I stand by it. The chaos that followed last Monday and Tuesday should have told us that what we did was right. Imagine the thousands of people that besieged the banks. A lot of them were at the bank to collect the little money they had, some were at the banks to get their ATM. All the while they were at home in agony. What kills more than loneliness and agony? We heard of one or two people slumping at the bank.

People fail to see the connection between economy, finance and health. But there is a very strong connection. Many people could have developed different ailments stuck at home. Many people hadn’t seen their loved ones for weeks. You saw a lot of people walking through Asaba and Onitsha to meet their loved ones because the Niger Bridge was shut for days. So, I stand by my advocacy of opening the economy, not because I believe the economy is more important than health. But also because as documented, in that interregnum where people were locked down in their houses things happened that weren’t documented. One, a lot people were afraid of visiting hospitals, out of the fear of COVID-19 and the inability to move. Therefore, they didn’t take care of their health. Globally, we heard of the increase in domestic violence, child abuse or people dying of other diseases in their homes. The reopening of the economy came as a huge relief for many. I saw the mama put with people around them selling their food down the road. Where were people like them during the lockdown? We saw the people at the banks; you then ask who did government give the palliatives? How was the money meant for palliatives spent?

Your answer focused more on the human aspect of the COVID-19 lockdown. As an economist, I thought you would be more concerned about the dire straits Nigeria has found itself in. We have crashed oil prices; the Federal Government has taken huge loans, as well as resorting to the taking from the rainy day fund managed by the Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority…..

It’s still all about the human factor. Like I said earlier, we fail to see the link between economics, finance and health. Aside from this, the issues you raised are part of my concerns. The skies are falling. We have the scenario where crude oil price fell. This is the only thing that Nigeria sells. Not only was the price of crude oil down, our government agencies went to sleep for weeks. The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) knows people won’t pay tax this year. Where will they get the money from? FIRS was sending out tweets for people to pay their taxes in advance. But they can see that they are going to miss their target by a mile this year. So, the model of shutdown wasn’t well thought out globally. I have heard it said that this (pandemic) is a war. Do you sleep through a war? Who are those fighting on our behalf? Now the question is, how does Nigeria get out of this? We have a scenario where the current situation is still being treated like a partisan issue. There is no broad based coalition of people with ideas on what we can do. No matter how they want to do it, my message is that we have to be equitable. Whatever we have to share, we need to think of the estimated 200 million people in Nigeria. We should focus on the most vulnerable. This is not the time for frivolities as they are used to. The idea may be that the little that is available, a couple of people would sit on it and just to behave like they used to. The result is that you will zombify the people and then precipitate some kind of asymmetric and spontaneous violence, which we have never seen in these parts. Our people are not violent. But nobody should push them.

Read more @:http://frontlinenews.com.ng/covid-19-pandemic-opportunity-for-nigeria-to-restructure-end-corruption-tope-fasua/