Guys,

Below is an excerpt from today's Guardian newspaper, most sensible speech I have ever heard from any Nigeria leader, both dead or alive.

I think with our support for GEJ, we can realize the dream of the country we wish to be.



Nation can do without oil

FOR the second time in a week, President Goodluck Jonathan, yesterday maintained that strong institutions and not strong leaders can make Nigeria great.

He also said the country needs reliable data for planning to realise its dreams of becoming a nation that meets the needs of its people and also capable of providing genuine leadership for the rest of Africa.

Jonathan had in a response to critics of his style of government last Sunday, said he would not behave as an Army General or the Biblican Pharaoh to solve the nation’s daunting problems.

The President again at the 51st Independence anniversary lecture at the auditorium of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Abuja yesterday, pledged to build strong institutions that will make the system run smoothly.

He said: “I believe that for us to get to where we want to be, as a nation we have to build strong institutions and when we build them, they will drive the process.”

And from the guest speaker at the lecture, Prof. Richard Dowden, corruption and the politics of malfeasance are the major problems facing Nigeria.

He said of the $1 trillion illegally transferred to safe tax havens overseas from Western and Central Africa, Nigeria accounts for $89.5 billion.

In the audience were the Speaker of the House of Representatives Aminu Tambuwal, some state governors and members of the diplomatic corps.

Jonathan, who responded to Dowden’s comments on the Nigeria’s electoral system and other matters, said the reforms in the sector have produced credible elections last April, which have shown that what Nigeria needs to develop are strong institutions and strong people.

Dowden had identified transparency and good governance as vital elements that must be adopted by Nigeria to move to the next level of development.

Jonathan said in the pursuit of strong institutions, his administration had strengthened the security services and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to conduct an election that the whole world accepted. “So, I normally say that when we strengthen our institutions, the system will begin to run properly. I do tell people in my office that ministers don’t need to see me if the system is working well.”

On data, the President raised some posers: “Can any Nigerian being a minister, permanent secretary or director go anywhere and say exactly the population of Nigeria? For us to move forward, we must know ourselves. Fortunately, the Minister of Nnational planning is here. I remember as Vice President then, I was disturbed at a programme, where the Minister of Finance gave different statistics, the Planning Minister gave another statistics and the CBN governor did the same. Then I said no, we cannot run the country this way and I called a meeting to get the figures right.”

He continued: “When the 2006 population Census was to be done, we were discussing about it either in 2004 or 2005. I was there as Deputy Governor of Bayelsa State and the issue was if we are going to put religion in the form. If you look at what we did, there was no column for religion. If you go to a place like Malaysia and enter a taxi-cab, the ordinary taxi driver will tell you the population of Malaysia. He will tell you how many are Chinese, how many are this and how many are that.”

Jonathan painted a picture, which suggested that Nigeria is moving forward despite the perceived malfeasance of those who drive the nation’s bureaucracy “, We are moving this country forward and we are trying to do things differently not by the President carrying a big stick and breaking the heads of all corrupt people. I will not be breaking the heads of all civil servants that report to work by 9.00 a.m. I was told that you rarely see people going to work by 8.00 a.m. even though the period of service is between 8 a.m. and 4.00 p.m. How many directors come to work by 8.00 a.m.? I’m not sure 10 per cent of them come to work by that time. I’m not going to chase them by carrying a big stick into their ministries, but I believe that for us to get to where we want to be as a nation, we have to build strong institutions and when we build them, they will drive the process, even if I am sick for six months, ordinary Nigerians will not know that the President is sick because the system is running.”

He also spoke on the kind of working relationship he loves to have with his cabinet members. The President said “ministers have budgets approved by the National Assembly to run their ministries, so even if a minister does not see the President for four years and he is competent, he can run the ministry in a way that Nigerians will know that we are working. Yes, because we are just starting, so many things are not done properly, so almost everything needs the President’s intervention because we want to alter something that has been there but is not good enough. In that case, you need the signature of the President to give the power. Now, we are in the process of that transformation, by the time we finish setting up all these structures, Nigeria will get to where we are all hoping to be. I have no doubt about that.”

On Nigeria’s mono-cultural economy, Jonathan attributed it to oil. “It is not just the oil but any country that is blessed with a mineral, extractive industry generally breed corruption and that is the perception of the people. I am hoping for a Nigeria that will in the next 10 years or thereabout run government without oil and we can do it. If you look at the size of Nigeria, all the imports that come into Africa, about 20 per cent of them come into this country. If we have well-managed ports alone, the income we receive from trading activities will be enough, but we are still running deficit budgets because there are a lot of leakages. Things are not being done properly. Some goods that are supposed to be cleared through Nigerian wharfs are being cleared through other countries or smuggled into Nigeria. We consume all those goods but we cannot clear them through our wharfs.”

Jonathan spoke elaborately on the issue especially as it connects with the ideal of making the institutions in Nigeria run.

He said: “We need to fix a number of critical institutions, it may be painful but we have to do it. People will complain that politics is being used but it must be done. By the time, these institutions are fixed, I believe in the next 10 years or so, we should be able to run our economy without oil. For now, about the 53 African states, about 20 or so produce oil. We are getting oil everywhere but the quantity may differ. If we continue to rely on oil, of course, it is also a wasting asset. Developed countries are thinking about alternatives. They are developing generating plants that don’t require hydrocarbon fuel. In the next 50 years, you do not know what the world would be. People may be driving cars without oil, so we need to plan for a nation that can do without oil, ”

The President said the trend might have informed the prediction about Nigeria collapsing but “when we look well, Nigeria is moving. A country that everybody expects to collapse and because it looks like a heated oven is making giant strides.”

He said the country has good people in athletics and in academics, “so, why can’t we fix our country and that is the kernel.”

Dowden, who is the Director of Africa Royal Society, asserted that Nigeria and some African countries have been adopting “wrong economic policies for political reasons.”

He said: “The fifth and main problem that Nigeria faces is politics. Often, Nigeria and much of Africa have followed the wrong economic policies for political reasons, This has accounted for the over 100 million Nigerians living in poverty - which is a quarter of the total poverty in sub-Sahara Africa.”

According to the renowned analyst and author, “after oil and corruption, which are closely linked, I would say that Nigeria’s reputation in the past still puts off investors and tourists.”

Dowden did not spare Nigeria’s resource allocation formula. He said: “What I see here is that perceived or real unfairness in the system of resource allocation has led to fierce competition for success or just survival. I would say that the competitive, creative spirit this creates is far more powerful than in any other country in the world.”

Swiftly identifying corruption, poor reputation and flight of human capital as other factors that have worked against the country’s economic prosperity, he regretted that Nigeria at independence in 1960 had a trade surplus with the United Kingdom and substantial reserves, which have now gone up in flame.

Just as Nobel laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka warned on Monday, Dowden concluded that if the upcoming generation of Nigerians was unable to fulfil its potential, the country stood the risk of experiencing mass revolt.

Dowden, who authored the book: “Africa: Altered States, Ordinary Miracles,” noted with dismay that Nigeria’s economic woes began with the advent of oil, which according him, led to a lack of initiative from successive governments.

His lecture was titled: “Nigeria in Transformation.”

He went hard on members of the National Assembly, whom he darted for earning the “highest amount paid congressmen the world over.” Nigeria, he said cannot continue with the socio-economic disparity that exists between the rich and the poor. Recent cases of violence, he submitted, “were not about religion.”

Former British broadcasting Corporation (BBC) correspondent Michael Wrong and renowned poet and critic, Odia Ofemiun, both discussants at the lecture, called on the government to end the lopsided distribution of wealth and diminishing amount of opportunities for Nigerians in the lower rungs of society.

Ofemiun wondered why “we give poor children poor education to keep them poor.”

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