₦airaland Forum

Ikaeniyan0:
You better go to Eko Atlantic and see construction work going on yourself



Some of you guys on Nairaland are extremely stupid.

You have never been to Eko Atlantic city, but you claim is a white elephant project. I told you to visit and see the construction work going there... Look at the kind of foolish reply you gave me.

Some of you guys are irritating.

You just love bringing your fraustration online and start lamenting.

Which construction though? I was there like 4 months ago. Asides the US embassy, there are only like 3towers under construction there.

Even the various sub topics I touched on can be expanded into full position papers with a lot more detail.

There is a lot more to unpack in terms of what Nigeria should be doing to drive economic growth going forward, but these are just snippets!

NIGERIA AT 63!

As Nigeria hits 63, we are arguably at our most challenged state as a Nation. While Nigeria has been deteriorating on many fronts over the last 40 odd years, we seem to have taken a sharp turn for the worse over the last decade. The middle class that seemed to be growing in the early days of our democracy has been under severe attack in the last decade. Food prices have risen due to the triple whammy of lower food production due to insecurity, high cost of transportation due to escalating diesel prices and devaluation of the local currency – making imports more expensive. Besides food, the country is firmly in the grips of an inflationary wave. Transportation, rent, energy, house prices have all escalated, while incomes – legal incomes at least- have been constant or at best have seen marginal increases.
Therefore, on this day of Nigeria’s independence, I offer my thoughts on how to revamp the Nigerian economy. There are many aspects to the work that need to be done, but I would like to discuss it on the following themes. What is written here is just high level. In the interest of time and space, I will not delve into the finer details of the themes discussed here.

ECONOMY:
Private Sector Participation: While Nigeria claims to operate a capitalist economy, the government, particularly at the Federal and State levels holds undue influence over economic activity. In order to kick start economic activity, wage growth and productive money circulation, Nigeria needs to hand the reign of the economy to the private sector. The private sector can allocate capital more efficiently, will create better quality jobs, generate tax income for the government and ensure that critical infrastructure is far better maintained. Areas where the private sector will do a better job include managing our airports, managing the railway sector, managing high traffic roads, managing ports,
Therefore, the government should do the following:
• Concession our international airports
• Concession the newly constructed railways and allow private railway operators to run it.
• Concession critical road infrastructure, such as Lagos-Ibadan; Port Harcourt Enugu; Lagos -Shagamu -Benin; Abuja -Kaduna-Kano etc
• Concession Warri, Port Harcourt and Calabar ports
• Sell government properties across the nation, particularly in Lagos.
• Reduce NNPC stake in JV’s to a non-controlling stake. NNPC has held the oil sector back by not paying cash calls and slowing down on new oil and gas projects.

Revitalizing the Middle Class: Relative to our huge population of more than 200 million people, Nigeria’s GDP is relatively low. GDP is the Gross Domestic Product and in simple terms is the total value of goods and services produced in a country. When looked at this way, and we consider the number of companies and industries that have closed shop and/or left Nigeria in the last 20 years, its not surprising why our GDP is low relative to our size – Michellin, Dunlop, Shoprite, Mr Price, Exide batteries, Game, GSK, Procter & Gamble, WEMPCO Steel, Etisalat, Woolworths and many more have all left the country in recent years.

There are many factors for this, but one which I want to focus on is the disappearing middle class. If the ability of the Nigerian to purchase the goods and services of these companies continues to dwindle, then its not surprising that many if them cannot break even. One way to revitalize Nigeria’s economy is to bring back the middle class. One way to do this is to dramatically increase the wages of the lower-level public workers, whilst also reducing the number of staff to balance things out. I’ve always taken the view that it’s better to employ 5 people and pay N150k a month, than employ 50people and pay them N30k a month. Whilst prices of things have become expensive, its not always that these things are overpriced, but rather the wages of Nigerian workers are ridiculously low!

Therefore, the government should do the following:
• Implement the Orasanye report and reduce agencies, ministries and parastatals. Nigeria should target a 40% reduction in staff strength in the next 3 years. Of course, appropriate gratuities and severance should be paid where applicable.
• Convert many of these agencies and parastatals into limited liability companies owned by the government. That way they are self-managing and go off the government payroll. This will force efficiency and productivity. If they cannot ensure enough revenues to pay wages and operate, then they should do what other companies do – increase prices, reduce cost. If Arise TV and Channels can survive on their own, why can’t NTA!?
• Pay a better wage to those that remain. In my view, the national minimum wage should not be less than N150k net a month.

Civil Service Reform: Connected to the point above, even if we were able to reduce the over bloated civil service, even those why remain need to dramatically change their ways of working. The civils service must be run the way a private entity would manage its human resource. The organizational hierarchy must be very clear, with well documented job titles and job descriptions. Every position must be a box, with a clear mapping to the head of the organization. Recruitment must be based on these established job roles. Promotion also needs to be merit/performance based. My spirit is always grated when I hear the popular phrase “I am due for promotion!” How can anyone be promoted simply due to the passage of time!? There is no measuring of performance to agreed targets, ways of working, proactive contributions, solutions provided, policy papers written etc How can a supervisor of maintenance in the Southeast zone of FERMA be promoted simply because he has been a supervisor for 10years, when the roads in the zone are in shocking state! What then has he been maintaining in that time that deserves a promotion?

Therefore, the Nigerian government should do the following:
• Reform the civil service to a performance-based reward system
• Employment should be done to fill vacant positions based on an established organizational structure.
• The process of creating and changing that organizational structure should be very firm and approved only by the Federal Executive Council after initial approval by the Head of Service.
• Promotion should only be if a vacancy on the next level exists and based on good performance ranking against established metrics at the beginning of the year

Tax Reform: The Nigerian state’s reliance on crude oil for revenues and foreign exchange for the past 5 decades has created a lazy government. Now with revenues from crude oil dwindling for many reasons, the government is realizing it must focus on tax revenues. Again, there are many aspects to improving tax collection and administration in Nigeria. But a few things I’d like to point out here. First, the wealthy in Nigeria need to pay their fair share. The wealthy are prone to evading tax all over the world, but its much worse in Nigeria. Officials of the tax revenue agencies in Nigeria are usually either bullied or bribed by the elite. Interestingly a wealthy Nigerian with a house in the US or UK cannot get around not paying property taxes. A $350k house in Houston will set you back circa $6k in property taxes each year. Yet the same individual with a N1bln house in Ikoyi either pays nothing at all or a paltry sum.

Asides the wealthy though, tax administration needs to improve to bring more people into the tax net. The easiest way to do this is with technology. There are many types of income that are not taxed in this country – income from rents, fees paid to realtors, income earned by caterers at events, income earned by comedians, musicians, MC’s, income earned by Uber drivers and many, many more typically go under the radar. No doubt, Nigerians feel entitled to evade taxes, due to the infrastructural deficiencies in Nigeria, but that’s a topic for another day.

Therefore, the Nigerian government should do the following:
• Provide more structure around activities of the Nigerian economy. For eg every rental agreement must be registered to have legal effect
• Professionalize many sectors of the economy. Someone shouldn’t be able to come from the village to Lagos to be a property agent without becoming a licensed member of Realtors Association of Nigeria. And to continue to be a member
• Make every Nigerian’s NIN their Tax Identification Number. And make the NIN a requirement of every economic activity, so that every person’s economic activity can be better tracked.
• Make it impossible to engage in economic activity without filing personal income taxes every year.
• However, the process of filing tax returns should be made very easy online. For those in paid employment it should be easy because its already covered by PAYE, but filing tax returns becomes more important to folks outside of paid employment. I’d like to see a Davido or Whizkid filing tax returns.
• Focus on the online economy. Netflix, Amazon prime video, apps on apple store and Google play store that Nigerians subscribe to cannot be operating in Nigeria and not paying taxes.

Energy Availability: To move the Nigerian economy forward, it needs to be powered by energy, the most important of which is electricity. That 200mln+ Nigerians are managing 5,000MW, while South Africa with 58mln people produces 58,000MW shows the scale of the gap that needs to be covered. Even with 24hr electricity, Nigeria will struggle to compete due to our many other structural and infrastructural deficiencies, but at least, that should be the minimum foundation of a level playing field.

Therefore, the Nigerian government should do the following:
• Prioritize the construction of the Mambilla 3,000MW hydro dam.
• Prioritize private sector led large scale solar and wind in secure parts of Nigeria with abundant solar radiation and wind resources.
• Increase domestic gas capacity to ensure stranded gas power plants across the country can produce at full capacity.
• Decouple the national grid. Let a GENCo bypass the national grid and sell to a specific DISCo on a willing buyer, willing seller basis if the capacity of the grid to get the power to the consumers is a hinderance.
• Create a simpler tiered electricity tariff structure, that protects the poor, low electricity consumers, but ensures fair pricing for those who consume a lot of electricity and can pay for it.

Export – leveraging on Nigerians in Diaspora: The need for more foreign exchange inflows into Nigeria is undeniable. The lack of forex supply during crippling demand is the reason why the Naira is currently at $/N750 or $/980, depending on which market matters more to you. Whichever way you cut it though, the Naira has devalued by about 40 – 60% from the beginning of the year. Again, there are many ways to address this in the short, medium and long terms, but a short term one that I think is easy to set up is leveraging on Nigerians in UK, US Canada and South Africa. It breaks my heart when I go to US and buy a small tuber of Yam for $20 (N18,000), which would cost about N500 in Benue state and maybe N1,000 in Lagos! The prices of other Nigerian delicacies that our people in diaspora crave for is also quite high. How about if the government created a food export program focused on Nigerians in diaspora! It would provide jobs for farmers in Nigeria, foreign exchange for Nigeria and reduce the cost of Nigerian food for those in the diaspora – a win, win!

Therefore, the Nigerian government should do the following:
• Engage with Nigerians in diaspora through the various Nigerian Embassies and High Commissions. Map where Nigerian’s are and target African stores close to them for delivery.
• Liaise with agricultural ministries and agencies of foreign governments to establish food standards.
• Create a logistics infrastructure to move produce from the farms to ports for export in an efficient and effective manner.
• If necessary, designate specific farms as export farms to better monitor and ensure agreed food quality standards are being kept.
• Rather than export in raw form, we can create processing zones to convert raw yam into packaged, frozen yam slices and yam fries.

Funny enough rich Nigerians pay plenty property tax on their houses abroad.
But if tell them to pay property tax on their house in banana island, they will shout from here till tomorrow.

Neduzze5:
All these South West youths littering Abuja and causing nuisance with their motorcycles sef.


They should go back to their States of origin and continue skull mining or plantain banditry.

Folks from the southwest riding motorcycle in Abuja? Really! I thought all the motorcycle riders in Abuja were all from the north

Galaxyss:
Naso... What about their data zapping, Won't they do something about that?


Because now 2gb worth of data can't download file of 1.5gb

There isn't any data being Zapped. Most of you guys complaining of your data finishing on time, don't realize that you need to switch off automatic downloads from the multitude of apps you have on your phone

DaddyJapan:
Long overdue.



Source: https://www.thecable.ng/the-nigerian-billionaires-and-tinubus-tax-reform

Indeed. I wonder if Whizzkid, Davido, Rhema, Ayra Star, Nollywood stars etc pay Tax. Even Bola Tinubu and lll the politicians, where is their tax return?

There are many other folks too who do not pay income tax.

Landlords who collect rent
Food people who go to cater at parties
Comedans and MC's
Those who do business on social media
People who do property agent

Left to me, personal income tax act should be modified such that you can't do the following if you don't file your income tax annually;

Register a vehicle
Register land documents
Get a international passport
Get a driver's license
Buy an airplane ticket domestic or international
Utilize any form of public transport
Register your children in any school - private or public
Operate a bank account etc

VawulentMan:
But can not find killer herdsmen, kidnapping bandits, Iswap, boko haram and other militant insurgents

Check Nairaland over the past 5yearz and you will find several threads where BH and ISWAP have been bombed.

mejetov422:
Who ever is still supporting this government need a brain check.

This government is less of the issue! The real issue was Buhari's 8 years that put us in this mess!! What do you think printing N22TRILLION is going to do to the economy!!?

Quite simple -
1.Inflation (cos easy NAIRA is chasing few goods and services)
2.Devaluation (easily gotten Naira is chasing few dollars)
3.High Property prices ( same as above - money that people didn't really work for, they are willing to pay any price for property just to 'legitimize' it. That's why property in Lagos follows no economic sense.

Bobloco:
https://dailytrust.com/hardship-were-tired-of-fgs-soon-promises-tuc/

As far as I'm concerned, I see a script playing out here!

I suspect BAT may want to announce new minimum wage in his Oct 1 message to the nation. So this new threat from TUC for TOTAL strike on Oct 3 is playing into it.

Don't be surprised that when the announcement is made on Oct 1, TUC will then calll of the strike because Mr President has performed. Then his handlers a la Ajuri Ngelale will then go to town about how the President has a listening ear and responded promptly to avert a national shut down on Oct 3!!!

Bliss52:
A million cars for 22 million people


Common be logical

Wow!! If that many people are rushing for the train, then LASG need to increase the frequency very rapidly.

For me from Mile 12 to Marina, there should be a train leaving Mile 12 every 15mins at 6.30am, 6.45, 7am, 7.15am, 7.30am, 7.45am, 8am

From 8am, it can then be every 30mins till end of the day, as the rush in the evening will be from the Marina end for those closing from work.

Islie:
Subsidy: FG says reducing petrol consumption, vehicles on roads achievement by Tinubu


“The singular action has reduced Nigeria’s consumption of petrol by 33 per cent, reduced the level of emission generated by Nigerians.”




https://gazettengr.com/subsidy-fg-says-reducing-petrol-consumption-vehicles-on-roads-achievement-by-tinubu/

Looking at the write up and the headline, I see there is a bit of a disconnect between the two! The headline attempts to make what the Minister said more scandalous!

Reduction of cars on the roads and subsequent reduction in air pollution might be a fallout of subsidy removal. Is this a fact? YES! Is that the reason for subsidy removal? NO!

Its like during COVID, when the whole world was at rest, the quality of air improved dramatically because there was less pollution. Of course that doesn't mean we want to have COVID everyday.

However, if the Minister is all for climate change and reducing emissions, then his government should have a clear plan for renewables, electric and hybrid vehicles, mass transit etc that reduce petrol, gas and diesel fumes into the atmosphere.

To be brutally honest, a lot of people in university today don't have the mental capacity to be there! Even when I was in uni 25 years ago, there were lots of people who passed through by cheating, sorting, sleeping with lecturers, or threatening lecturers! The situation must be much worse now.

What we need is better quality primary and secondary school education.

The standards for entry into university should actually be set a bit higher.

ElSudani:
Absolute nonsense. If you have a US passport to a visa free country why would you present a Nigerian passport with it?

These Obidients and their childish lies.

Did you read at all??

Unbiased1:
If the Federal Government cannot maintain or reconstruct any of their existing infrastructure in the East, why not allow the East reduce their remittance to the federal government and use that money to work on all infrastructure in the East? Most of the horrible infrastructure projects in the East are federal government infrastructure.

LOL, which remittance to the FG? Aren't all states going to Abuja to collect allocation?

thesicilian:
Obviously this is ongoing renovation, from the twitter posts attached. Though in all honesty I don't see any outcome that could justify this stadium still being considered as the National Stadium

Totally agree. We should stop calling it national stadium. It is so outdated. We have only one national stadium ND it's in Abuja.

And what exactly will this stadium be used for in Lagos after it's renovated? Nothing happens there then it goes bad again.

Irony1:
Oga stop being dense. Ask any oil and gas professional all the IOCs are scaling down investments in Nigeria and increasing in investments in Angola and Mozambique. Keep living in lies and deceit una eye go soon clear.

I Am an Oil and Gas professional, you nincompoop!

casualobserver:
What is clear is that not only are too many ignorant people given a platform to display their ignorance, too many Nigerians have a plroblem with acknowledg8mg of celebrating good nes because it hasn’t come from their side whatever that side may be. The problem of Nigeria are Nigerians.

Honestly! This social media just gives semi educated folks a platform to say and share nonsense, beer parlour gist. It doesn't mean one can't have a different opinion or that I'm always right, but the sheer lack of commonsense and fact checking is just absurd. I don't know what folks use the data on theor devices for if they cant even do a google search before saying rubbish.

The one that annoys me most is this constant arguement about why DSTV cant give us pay per channel or pay per view like other countries. I have personally gone to DsTv website of like 6 African countries and the nonsense they keep clamoring for doesn't exist in those countries!!

No single person has been able to share alink to a DSTV website of a country where it is advertised that you can pay for only select channels, separate from a bouquet, or you can switch off your subscription when you travel or when you are at work.

Irony1:
You know the bad thing about propaganda, the people who spread this always think we are fools. The same ExxonMobil like Shell and others have divested in their shallow water and inland oil well yo only remain offshore and you are claiming oil and gas commitments. When you people want to be serious we will know

So is there no oil and gas offshore? You sef are not as smart as you think.

mrvitalis:
Same shell and Mobile selling of their asset?

APC should put effort in their propaganda at least na

So many Nigerians think they are well informed and smart by don't realise how dumb they are!!

Most of the IOC's have been very clear that they are divesting their stake in the ONSHORE aspect of their business because of the activities of crude theft.

They have all said they will keep their investments in the OFFSHORE aspect, as that is not subject to vandalization. They also plan to keep investing in GAS, because gas is pretty much impossible to steal like oil because it's a intangible product!!

Be EDUCATED!!

adenigga:
Source: https://punchng.com/JUST-IN-Mohbad-Sympathisers-dispersed-with-teargas-at-Lekki-tollgate

Nigerian youth were able to mobilize to protest harassment by SARS! Nigerian youth are able to mobilize for Mohbad - which was a name I had never heard before now.

But Nigerian youth are not able to mobilize for corruption, low minimum wage, high cost of governance, economic mismanagement, legalized theft at the NASS!!!

Funkyswagzz:
Most of you don't even understand what subsidy is

Oya, you who knows, kindly explain it to us.

Rayban25:
Funny enough Nigerians will still go about their normal lives. You will still see traffic on the road even with this price that is what is giving them liver to keep increasing it. Nigerians are mentally not ok upstairs

So we should not live again because petrol prices increase abi? We shouldn't go to work? We shouldn't go to the hospital if sick? We shouldn't go to the market to buy food? We should all just stay at home abi?

Folks are managing the increases the best way then can. Some are car pooling with neighbors for school runs, others are creating shifts to reduce people who need to come to the ofice. A radio station mentioned that instead of having 2 presenters on their morning show, its now one presenter to reduce need to be in the office! Folks are doing the best they can!!

adenigga:
Source: https://punchng.com/FG-may-pay-N1.68tn-fuel-subsidy-marketers-forecast-N900/litre

The statement ascribed to the CSO makes no sense. Since NNPC is the sole importer of petrol, which marketers is he referring to that benefit from the devaluation to ask for higher payments? People who don't even know the goings on in the industry just like to say nonsense, because it will sell in the papers.

Same way the marketers are always saying the price of petrol will only crash when we use Nigerian crude and not imported crude!! How will it crash, when the crude will be paid for and not free. Even if petrol reduces by N70 because the freight and import duties etc are no longer there, is N70 a crash!!?

Guyman01:
Fulani una time don pass, see where una brother nepotism don land us, complaining about Yorubanization by Tinubu makes you look like hypocrites.

Nigerians lamented about how one region totally dominated the establishment under Buhari to a point that if you visit NNPC headquarters in Abuja on Monday you will think you are in a Jumat mosque in Kano on Friday with the number of people you will see on Kaftan and jalabia. Just check the names of those sacked, its mostly Fulani Muslims who mismanaged the NNPC and put us un the current mess where we can't refine our own crude but depend on Dangote a renowned Fulani monopolist

I kind of agree. Whilst I'm not tribalistic and I do agree that competence shoukd reign, but the truth of the matter is that the north had been feeding fat on this nation for too long.
And the annoying fact is that they are the most illiterate.

If you look at the national register of most professional bodies like:

Institute of Chartered Accountant of Niveria
Chartered Institute of Taxation
Nigerian Society of Engineers
Nigeria Institute of Quantity Surveyors
Nigeria Institute of Architects
Nigeria Medical Association
Nigerian Dental Association

And many more, you hardly find northerners there, so how come in government they are by far in the majority?? To the extent that of you go to NAPIMS, FIRS, NDIC etc they are always the bosses, while Yorubas and Igbos are doing the heavy lifting?

One day I was driving past NDIC building at Nitel House on Marina at closing time, I was shocked by the number of northerners leaving the office.... In LAGOS!! How many Yorubas will you find in a government establishment in Kaduna or Kano!!

How can the most illiterate part of the country dominate the rest of the country in civil service and government? It makes no sense!?

If you do proper employment evaluation test for many northerners in government I cn bet you 50% will fail. Many of them enter university with 120 Jamb. Meanwhile in the SW and SE, you will score 240 and still be hustling for admission!!

Parasolorg:
Congratulations, we need feature where you can negotiate with the driver.

They will waste everybody's time. If I'm going to work I have no time to be haggling with folks

ijustdey:
https://punchng.com/s3xual-harassment-varsities-polys-clamp-down-on-35-profs-others/?amp

In this day and age, ASUU is expecting students to report sexual harassment in suggestion boxes!!? Instead of creating an app or webpage on the school website or platform for this.

AlexBells:
I had always believed that with the abundance of energy resources in the form of coal, gas and crude oil all available in Enugu in comercial quantities, that Enugu is supposed to be an energy and electricity hub and Today
the executive governor of Enugu state has not just passed the electricity bill, he also aimed to move Enugu economy from 4.4 to 30 billion USD.



https://businessday.ng/news/article/gov-mbah-signs-electricity-bill-into-law/?amp=1

There is a lot more to having stable electricity in any state than signing Electricity Acts into Law! The state regulatory body will still have to engage with NERC and the existing DISCO, except the expectation is that brand new electricity cables will be laid everywhere!

And the state will still have to find investors, who are in short supply, considering the pitfalls with investing in Nigeria. Electricity in particular is a very difficult product to control and monitor effectively. Nigeria probably has one of the largest rates of electricity theft in the world.

And it remains to be seen if any Nigerian investors will go into this sector, the more technical a space, the more Nigerians run a way from it, since we are primarily traders and not business men. We don't know how to add value to stuff - only import and buy and sell is what we do best.

wink2015:
He spoke the truth and the facts and it is you that is turning the facts into a TRIBAL issues.

If Nigeria is running a true federalism the federal government should have no business sending war planes to bomb an oil producing community.

It is wrong.

Why not use that war planes to fight BOKO HARAM BOYS.

It is local civilian they are showing STRONG BONES for !

Don't be daft!! There have been several reports over the years of NAF jets bombing Boko Haram and ISWAP sites!

Stop this selective memory!!

Lukepeter:
That's promotion of criminality, they should apply for licensing like any serious person and not cutting through corners, did you even bother to ask yourself where they get the crude oil from? Stop supporting an act criminality.

Are you minding the guy. The shallowness of Nigerian's is alarming. The lack of critical thinking and use of logic on Nairaland and other social media by Nigerians show that many are literate but few are educated.

Crude that oil companies invested billions of dollars to get out of the ground and illegal refiners are stealing is what people are saying they should be allowed to operate because refineries are not working.

Okay, if government builds 10 refineries and all the crude coming from the ground is stolen, that what would have been the point of building those refineries? Where will the crude to get the refineries working then come from?

[quote author=Corn247 post=125855599][/quote]Here we go again! I recall growing up in Ibadan in the late 80's and early 90's, we had TCTC - Trans City Transport Company. Where is that one today? If we had kept that from then till now, Ibadan would have a structure for mass transit. Now we have to start all over again. And there is no guarantee the next Governor after Makinde will keep this going.

If it remains in the hand of government, it will fail like a pack of cards. Best thing is for the government to create a company to manage the business with private sector. Let the cost of the buses and the bus stops and bus stations be on the balance sheet of the government, while the company set up 'leases' it from the government for free. That way the only thing the company will be responsible for is ensuring that the fees riders pay are sufficient to fund the operating costs - salaries of drivers, fuel and maintenance of the vehicles.