₦airaland Forum

Sanusism: The Grand Debate

Ever since the lanky governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Mr. Lamido Sanusi, dropped the bombshell by sacking the Chief Executives of 5 banks, two of whom were referred to as superbankers, the country has witnessed yet another round of economy-wide landslide, the last being when his predecessor, Professor Chukwuma Soludo, came with his 13-point banking reforms, chief among which was the oft-mentioned consolidation exercise.

Expectedly, an avalanche of approvals and criticisms has followed Mr. Sanusi's action. While some see it as a step in the right direction, some believe there is more to it than meets the eyes.

The decision, and the attendant issues, has since taken the centrestage in national discourse. It keeps getting more and more entertaining by the hour. The war is being fought on the pages of newspapers, in blogging sites and of course, in the various discussion forums on the internet.

Analysts and commentators have reeled out their opinions on this issue. In fact, every Ade,Ada and Adamu has continued to voice out his/her take on this issue, some informed and scientific, some mere sentiments.

On the pages of newspapers, respected columnists and writers have shared their opinions on the issue.
Thumbing up Sanusi and his actions are analysts like Simon Kolawole(ThisDay on Saturday), Reuben Abati(Guardian on Sunday),Dr. Otto Okiti([/b]Chief Economist,BusinessDay),[b]Simon Ekpe(Punch on Wednesday), Dayo Sobowale(ThisDay)  and several other contributors.
Disagreeing with Sanusi's actions are Dele Momodu(ThisDay on Sunday), Ijeoma Nwogwugwu(ThisDay on Saturday),Adebayo Adeniyi(Guardian contributor), and a host of other bloggers and writers.

As the microcosm of Nigeria, Nairaland has not been spared of the analysis of Sanusism(Def: The political economy of Sanusi's actions).
At the forefront of the Sanusi-is-right camp are Jarus and Wirinet. Other visible travellers in this ship are Jacobs123,naijatoday,bilymuse, and otokx
Mikeansy is by far the Chief critic of the CBN governor's moves. With him on this are Naijaking1,McKren,Papabrowne,na_so and others.

Many other nairalanders have also voiced out their opinions for and against the decisions.

So rather than threads unnecessarily mushrooming on this subject, I have opened this thread to have a coordinated debate among Nairalanders of different opinions on Sanusism.

I invite Seun and Richyblack to moderate. I'm aware they may have their personal opinion on this subject but I can count on them to be unbiased umpires.

This is meant to be an intellectual, fact-based dialogue; therefore insults and name-calling will not be welcomed.
Also, let's try to as much as possible leave Soludo out of this. This is not a Soludo criticising thread. It's purely on Sanusi and his policies.

I hereby formally invite Mikeansy and his team to present their arguments on what is wrong with Sanusi's moves and we pro-Sanusi are ready to take the points one by one.

Let's go,

I disagree with this action. EFCC should not have arrested the Non-EDs.

Epiphany:
@SBO and Jarus:

Seems like you guys are not the only ones wanting to reply Momodu, concerning his articles in his so called column.
While i understand that being a columnist is a very demanding responsibility, with having to creatively think of what to write daily/weekly/monthly, it is no excuse to continually pen meaningless and un-intelligent articles. I am a frequent 'browser' of Momodu's articles and can honestly say that his articles are all the same, predictable and quite elementary to say the least. With some of his famous lines such as, 'my friend. . .', my brother. . . ', 'Uncle this and Aunty that', his articles end up being more of name dropping exercises than informative and analytical pieces. He mostly seeks to inform us about his globetrotting, from Ghana to the USA to Uk etc, than give practical, REAL PRACTICAL steps as to how our country can be Changed.

Like Jarus also stated Momodu's devotion to the 'saintliness' of MKO and benevolence of Adenuga are not lost on many of us. All his articles must have some reference to MKO otherwise, that article is not seen as complete. Apart from these two behemoths, his relationship with all other moneybags in Nigeria has not gone un-noticed. Apart from these moneybags, his 'hand - in - glove' relationship with people in power is noted. More frequent statements like, 'When i saw with Aunty Dora at. . .' or 'At a party i sat between Ndukwe and. . .'. As far as i am concerned, he is just an avid name dropper and a celebrity sycophant.

In summary, i have nothing against this guy, as i admit that he is doing what he has to do to survive in the 'jungle' called Nigeria. One thing i can say though (like i mentioned in another thread) is that he should stick to celebrity journalism - publishing and maintaining ovation and not try to insult the rest of us with his 'serious and analytical' articles. Many of us would respect him much more that way, afterall, i admit that i love the colour and glossy outlook of his ovation magazine - which has often glorified those who have raped us.

I'm so surprised to know I'm not the only one having this opinion.
Dele Momodu should stick to his celebrity journalism(which is about praise-singing or as nairalanders would call it, ass-licking) where he's earning his bucks and which has made him one of Nigeria's richest journalists.
Most of his analyses in serious political and economic debates are at most laughable.

More frequent statements like, 'When i saw with Aunty Dora at. . .' or 'At a party i sat between Ndukwe and. . .'.

Makes me remember one of his recent pieces where all he had to write was how he sat in the 3rd row in Michael Jackson's burial.

Wow!   This guy beat me to writing rejoinder to that Dele Momodu article. I have been thinking and conceiving my rejoinder to that article since I read it in his column, PENdulum, this week Sunday. I have already captioned my rejoinder: DELE MOMODU: THE COLUMNIST AS A PRAISE-SINGER but have not had time to sit down and pen it.

My own rejoinder however slightly differs from the guy up there's. I do not support envy and Pull Him Syndrome syndrome, and Indeed, in my piece, ENTER SANUSI THE SANITY HARBINGER , I also expressed reservation over how some people went beyond issues to jubilate over the sack of Ibru and Akingbola, but Momodu's slighting of a genuine move, to me, is praise-singing taken too far. I'm not unaware of his association with the Akingbolas and Ibrus. My own piece is more general. I follow Dele Momodu's writings in his Sunday column, PENdulum, and if he's not praising MKO Abiola or Mike Adenuga, he will be praising Ghana. The most predictable columnist. It's not a crime to praise-sing really, but I just can't help penning my view of his writings in that my DELE MOMODU: THE COLUMNIST AS A PRAISE-SINGER and it was triggered by his latest piece on the sacked bank chiefs.

MrCrackles:
I have been fasting for over a decade and i play semi-pro footy
Midweek matches are fine coz they are at night but saturday games are pretty tough, if one is used to it, it shouldnt be a problem!
It is not easy but one can do it easily
My only problem is to hold my anger in order not to swear if i get rashly tackled or when the referee get's a decision wrong

Good to know you don't leave fasting for football.

Muntari is having similar issue at Inter
http://www.modernghana.com/sports/234475/2/muntari-replaced-because-of-ramadan.html


I think Muntari believes he can fast and play. Others in this category are Anelka, M. Sissoko, M. Diarra and a few others.
Kolo Toure, Samir Nasri admit not to fasting during matches.

It has gotten to this:






It has come to this.In the free-for-all that was our banking system, even a nanny could obtain a N13 billion loan from one of our top banks. Especially if she is the owner's nanny.

Such was the good fortune of Nanashetu Abdulai, who served Cecilia Ibru as nanny to her eldest son, Oboden.

In our banking system, this was enough collateral to persuade Oceanic Bank, which is now on life support and has been taken over by the Central Bank, to extend billions to Nanashetu. At least officially.

Ms. Abdulai, 51, also known as Nanashetu P. Bedell, received what is now being called the "nanny loan" based solely on her relationship with Mrs. Ibru, who is now a fugitive from the law and is wanted on fraud, money laundering, and stock manipulation charges by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. As at May 31, the loan was non-performing, according to a list released by the Central Bank.

Attempts to reach Ms. Abdulai at both her office and by telephone were unsuccessful.

Ms. Abdulai secured the loan as the sole director of Circular Global International Ltd. The company turned up as debtor number 13 on the CBN list of debtors to Oceanic Bank, is also the chief executive of the upscale corporate and household gift items suppliers called Nanshet Limited. Its head office is on Akin Olugbade high street of Victoria Island in Lagos.

Nanshet Ltd trades in corporate and household gift items and supplies majority, if not all, of Oceanic Bank's corporate souvenirs and staff insignias. Mrs. Ibru's signature neckties are samples of Nanshet's supplies.

Nanshet Limited started business in 1990 selling only Christian Books and Gifts. It now specialises in the procurement and distribution of electronics, household items and corporate gifts on a wholesale and retail level. It opened an American office in 2002

Ms. Abdulai was the nanny to the former Managing Director of Oceanic Bank and the first son of Mrs. Ibru, Oboden Ibru, but has become a close member of the family.

"She is generally called Sister Nana within Oceanic Bank," said one source. Another source referred to her as "Cecilia Ibru's twin sister," establishing the close relationship which Ms. Abdulai shares with the Ibru family and also alluding to the influence that Ms. Abdulai wields away from the domestic domain of the Ibru family to the corporate quarters where public funds are held.

"It is conventional wisdom in Oceanic that the fear of Sister Nana is the beginning of wisdom," said an insider who pleaded anonymity at Oceanic Bank Headquarters on Ozumba Mbadiwe Street on Victoria Island, Lagos.

No. 4 Akin Olugbade Street is just a white, plain looking one-storey building that is unremarkable in every aspect apart from sharing a fence with an Oceanic Bank branch. It looks more like a residential building than an office space. In a section of the compound, heaps of ceramic tiles are packed amid large wooden boxes.

Nanshet Mega Stores sell luxury gift items, including flower vases, ceramic plates, steel trolleys and large aluminium and enamel pots and dishes. It is located at the ground floor of City Mall directly opposite the entrance of the mall.
http://www.234next.com/csp/cms/sites/Next/News/National/5448760-146/story.csp

[quote author=~Borat~ link=topic=9969.msg4415586#msg4415586 date=1251151026]You are talking absolute THRASH! so who's gonna give the graduates work? Pakistan?
A great percentage of nigerian graduates are not even employable in nigeria, to talk of getting a job abroad with their worthless certificates. I'm sorry but i'm telling the truth. I was almost a victim of their mediocre and treacherous education. Thank goodness i escaped![/quote]. . . to Kazakstan

pongwa:
4 your info: aluta has already startd. I am waitin on d supply of gunz b4 i flag it off. Lol

Ife aluta doesn't involve guns. We fight by mouth, pen and other intellectual tools and we achieve results more than the agbero-styled alutas.

It's a continuum really. Soludo laid the foundation, Sanusi is also doing a good job. Whoever is taking over from Sanusi needs to also be seen working, and rightly too.

ajibawealt:
[b]Asalam Alaekum, I'd like to suggest rescheduling the event to Saturday, 29 August, this will give most of us the opportunity to enjoy the rewards of joint Iftaar and also the volume of traffic would be less for some of us staying on the mainland. Except the date, then every other arrangements I think is OK by me.[/b]Maa salam

I understand Saturday will be a better choice, but I personally will not be available on this date as I have to be in Kaduna first flight Saturday morning insha Allah.

So is a more economy-informed BusinessDay:

http://businessdayonline.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4671:who-saw-the-bank-crisis-coming&catid=123:special-report&Itemid=361

For every Vanguard, there is a more informed BusinessDay!
BusinessDay, a business and financial daily, which has no other business than analysing and reporting the economy says this:

http://businessdayonline.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4671:who-saw-the-bank-crisis-coming&catid=123:special-report&Itemid=361

Home Special Report Special Report Who saw the bank crisis coming?
Who saw the bank crisis coming?
Monday, 24 August 2009 01:24 MAX AMUCHIE
In a much celebrated article entitled: ‘The Agenda-Setting Role of the Mass Media in the Shaping of Public Opinion’, Maxwell McCombs, a professor at the University of Texas, Austin, United States notes: “The power of the news media to set a nation’s agenda, to focus public attention on a few key public issues, is an immense and well-documented influence. Not only do people acquire factual information about public affairs from the news media, readers and viewers also learn how much importance to attach to a topic on the basis of the emphasis placed on it in the news. Newspapers provide a host of cues about the salience of the topics in the daily news – lead story on page one, other front page display, large headlines, etc. Television news also offers numerous cues about salience – the opening story on the newscast, length of time devoted to the story, etc. These cues repeated day after day effectively communicate the importance of each topic. In other words, the news media can set the agenda for the public’s attention to that small group of issues around which public opinion forms.”
The principal outlines of this influence had been sketched as far back as 1922 by Walter Lippmann in his work, ‘Public Opinion’. According to Lippmann, the news media are a primary source of pictures in our heads about the larger world of public affairs, a world that for most citizens is “out of reach, out of sight, out of mind.”
One can therefore appreciate the critical role of the media as the fourth estate of the realm, a tag that has stuck since Edmund Burke, the 19th century British parliamentarian and political philosopher assigned the fourth position to the media in a realm that comprises the executive, the legislature and the judiciary in that order. What we know about the world is largely based on what the media decide to tell us. More specifically, the result of this mediated view of the world is that the priorities of the media strongly influence the priorities of the public. Elements prominent on the media agenda become prominent in the public mind. If the media fail, the society is doomed. In BusinessDay this is taken seriously.
The agenda of a media house is found in its pattern of coverage of public issues over some period of time, a week, a month, an entire year. Over this period of time, whatever it might be, a few issues are emphasised, some receive light coverage, and many are seldom or never mentioned. It should, however, be noted that the use of the term ‘agenda’ here is purely descriptive. There is no pejorative implication that a media house like BusinessDay ‘has an agenda’ that it relentlessly pursues as a premeditated goal. The media agenda presented to the public results from countless day-to-day decisions by BusinessDay journalists and board of editors about the issues of the moment.
The beginning of this year presented a clear picture of the shape of things to come and BusinessDay seized it and foresaw the sequence of events that culminated in the sack of five chief executive officers of Nigerian banks on Friday, August 14. For five days, February 16 to 20, BusinessDay ran a series on the Nigerian banking sector. It was a time that there was anxiety and excitement over the reappointment or otherwise of the former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Chukwuma Soludo. The professor of economics was appointed in 2004 and his coming led to consolidation in the Nigerian banking industry, an exercise that saw banks move their capital base from a paltry N2 billion to a minimum of N25 billion.
Initially, the move was criticised, but when at the end of 18 months period 25 banks scaled the huddle, consolidation was hailed as the best thing that had happened to the Nigerian banking industry.
[b]However, for keen observers and for BusinessDay board of editors, there were challenges and miscues that needed to be addressed, questions that needed urgent answers and measures that needed to be taken to steer the Nigerian banking sector away from a path of destruction.[/b]It has become public knowledge since the landmark decision of the sack of the five CEOs on August 14 that the huge debts totaling more than one trillion naira that crippled the five banks had to do with loans related to the capital market and the oil and gas sector.
The present governor of the CBN, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, while announcing the decision to sack the five managing directors, attributed the crisis in the banking sector to a failure of regulation over time. Long before then, BusinessDay had recognised the nexus between the margin loan crisis and weak regulation.
The paper’s lead story on Tuesday, February 17, 2009, was entitled: ‘How regulatory failure created margin loan crisis’. BusinessDay wrote: “A failure of regulatory oversight by the monetary authorities, charged with the responsibility to monitor and supervise how banks lend and disburse loans in the financial system, has been identified for the massive margin loan crisis hanging over the banking industry.
“The banking regulator, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is believed to have taken its eye off the ball while a number of banks moved recklessly into the capital market to perpetrate unwholesome practices designed and calculated to shore up the value of their shares in the capital market.”
We further went to report that the CBN only moved to play its oversight role after the crisis had deepened, and even when it did, its measures were targeted at general monetary concerns.

The next day, BusinessDay’s lead story was ‘Outrage as CBN lends to some banks at 11 percent’. The story reads: “The Central Bank’s expanded discount window through which it acts as lender of the last resort to the nation’s banks was opened a bit wider some months ago but access was initially fixed at an outrageously low eleven percent per annum.
“Almost a trillion naira was extended to the banks since September when access through the window was eased but some bankers thought it was unwise and indeed curious that the Central Bank will extend credit to banks at eleven percent interest rate at a time when deposits could command as much as 16 or even 17 percent.“Expectedly a deluge of requests came in from the banks, some simply because they could not just sit there watching their competitors profit from a seemingly unusual handout from the lender of last resort.”
The story quoted a banker who said: “All over the world, when you reach out to the lender of last resort, what you get is at a premium. But here banks were to all intents and purposes being rewarded instead of being punished.”
On page 53 of the same edition, we ran a story entitled, ‘With blurred supervision, banks are back to cooking the books’. In the story, BusinessDay writes, “Declarations of bogus profits and failure to disclose toxic assets have crept into Nigeria’s banking system. And analysts, worried by the trend, say banking in the country has gone back to the old days when banks kept more than one statement of account for different purposes.
“But the understanding of many was that the Central Bank of Nigeria would be up to the task of supervising and discouraging banks from cutting corners. Information reaching BusinessDay indicates that the apex bank may have been looking the other way while banks cheated their shareholders of billions of naira.”
On Thursday, February 19, 2009, BusinessDay came out with a lead headline ‘CBN’s lax supervision set stage for irregular financial reporting’. According to the report, CBN’s laxity in effectively monitoring financial reporting by banks had put it at daggers drawn with Nigerian Accounting Standards Board (NASB) charged with the task of ensuring compliance with set standards of financial reporting in Nigeria which is in line with international accounting standards.
For instance, according to the story, analysts expressed surprise over lack of details by the banks which supply only basic information as profits, earnings, shareholders’ funds at the exclusion of important details such as unsecured consumer credits, trade finance exposure, equity markets risk, corporate lending risk, sovereign fixed income as well as significant potential for foreign currency risk as point of large scale asset and liability transactions with international counterparts.
And on Friday, February 20, 2009, the last day of the series, which was three months ahead of the end of the tenure of Soludo as CBN governor, BusinessDay predicted that he would not be reappointed and took the public through reasons he was unlikely to get a second term in office.
Quoting an advisory by Eurasia, the leading political risk research and consulting firm based in New York, the United States, BusinessDay catalogued a number of CBN’s policy somersaults, condescending statements talking up the economy and flip-flops which together with other issues have helped to dent Soludo’s chances of re-appointment. The report reads: “Soludo’s current five-year tenure ends in May. While Soludo gained widespread international respect for his leadership in pushing banking sector reforms and a massive consolidation of the Nigerian banking system under the Obasanjo administration, his recent miscues on the direction of inflation and currency policy have left his much vaunted credibility damaged. Whoever replaces Soludo from Yar’Adua’s inner circle is likely to be more strongly market interventionist than Soludo, who had until recently been fairly neo-liberal in his policies.” Since Sanusi sacked Erastus Akingbola of Intercontinental Bank, Cecilia Ibru of Oceanic Bank, Okey Nwosu of FinBank, Barth Ebong of Union Bank and Sebastian Adigwe of Afribank, it has become public knowledge that they were the main beneficiaries of the controversial expanded discount window, had cooked books to hoodwink the public and their shareholders and exposure to margin loans. BusinessDay foresaw the present crisis and faithfully discharged its responsibility to the public, but nobody, not even the authorities paid attention.

For every Vanguard, there is a more informed BusinessDay! BusinessDay, a business daily which has no other business than reporting and analysing the economy says this:
http://businessdayonline.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4671:who-saw-the-bank-crisis-coming&catid=123:special-report&Itemid=361

Or is BusinessDay also pursuing a 'northern agenda' by alerting us of the impending crisis far back February 2009?

For every Vanguard there is a BusinessDay!
http://businessdayonline.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=4671:who-saw-the-bank-crisis-coming&catid=123:special-report&Itemid=361

Who saw the bank crisis coming?
Monday, 24 August 2009 01:24 MAX AMUCHIE
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In a much celebrated article entitled: ‘The Agenda-Setting Role of the Mass Media in the Shaping of Public Opinion’, Maxwell McCombs, a professor at the University of Texas, Austin, United States notes: “The power of the news media to set a nation’s agenda, to focus public attention on a few key public issues, is an immense and well-documented influence. Not only do people acquire factual information about public affairs from the news media, readers and viewers also learn how much importance to attach to a topic on the basis of the emphasis placed on it in the news. Newspapers provide a host of cues about the salience of the topics in the daily news – lead story on page one, other front page display, large headlines, etc. Television news also offers numerous cues about salience – the opening story on the newscast, length of time devoted to the story, etc. These cues repeated day after day effectively communicate the importance of each topic. In other words, the news media can set the agenda for the public’s attention to that small group of issues around which public opinion forms.”
The principal outlines of this influence had been sketched as far back as 1922 by Walter Lippmann in his work, ‘Public Opinion’. According to Lippmann, the news media are a primary source of pictures in our heads about the larger world of public affairs, a world that for most citizens is “out of reach, out of sight, out of mind.”
One can therefore appreciate the critical role of the media as the fourth estate of the realm, a tag that has stuck since Edmund Burke, the 19th century British parliamentarian and political philosopher assigned the fourth position to the media in a realm that comprises the executive, the legislature and the judiciary in that order. What we know about the world is largely based on what the media decide to tell us. More specifically, the result of this mediated view of the world is that the priorities of the media strongly influence the priorities of the public. Elements prominent on the media agenda become prominent in the public mind. If the media fail, the society is doomed. In BusinessDay this is taken seriously.
The agenda of a media house is found in its pattern of coverage of public issues over some period of time, a week, a month, an entire year. Over this period of time, whatever it might be, a few issues are emphasised, some receive light coverage, and many are seldom or never mentioned. It should, however, be noted that the use of the term ‘agenda’ here is purely descriptive. There is no pejorative implication that a media house like BusinessDay ‘has an agenda’ that it relentlessly pursues as a premeditated goal. The media agenda presented to the public results from countless day-to-day decisions by BusinessDay journalists and board of editors about the issues of the moment.
The beginning of this year presented a clear picture of the shape of things to come and BusinessDay seized it and foresaw the sequence of events that culminated in the sack of five chief executive officers of Nigerian banks on Friday, August 14.
For five days, February 16 to 20, BusinessDay ran a series on the Nigerian banking sector. It was a time that there was anxiety and excitement over the reappointment or otherwise of the former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Chukwuma Soludo. The professor of economics was appointed in 2004 and his coming led to consolidation in the Nigerian banking industry, an exercise that saw banks move their capital base from a paltry N2 billion to a minimum of N25 billion.
Initially, the move was criticised, but when at the end of 18 months period 25 banks scaled the huddle, consolidation was hailed as the best thing that had happened to the Nigerian banking industry.
However, for keen observers and for BusinessDay board of editors, there were challenges and miscues that needed to be addressed, questions that needed urgent answers and measures that needed to be taken to steer the Nigerian banking sector away from a path of destruction.
It has become public knowledge since the landmark decision of the sack of the five CEOs on August 14 that the huge debts totaling more than one trillion naira that crippled the five banks had to do with loans related to the capital market and the oil and gas sector.
The present governor of the CBN, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, while announcing the decision to sack the five managing directors, attributed the crisis in the banking sector to a failure of regulation over time. Long before then, BusinessDay had recognised the nexus between the margin loan crisis and weak regulation.
The paper’s lead story on Tuesday, February 17, 2009, was entitled: ‘How regulatory failure created margin loan crisis’. BusinessDay wrote: “A failure of regulatory oversight by the monetary authorities, charged with the responsibility to monitor and supervise how banks lend and disburse loans in the financial system, has been identified for the massive margin loan crisis hanging over the banking industry.
“The banking regulator, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is believed to have taken its eye off the ball while a number of banks moved recklessly into the capital market to perpetrate unwholesome practices designed and calculated to shore up the value of their shares in the capital market.”
We further went to report that the CBN only moved to play its oversight role after the crisis had deepened, and even when it did, its measures were targeted at general monetary concerns.
The next day, BusinessDay’s lead story was ‘Outrage as CBN lends to some banks at 11 percent’. The story reads: “The Central Bank’s expanded discount window through which it acts as lender of the last resort to the nation’s banks was opened a bit wider some months ago but access was initially fixed at an outrageously low eleven percent per annum.
“Almost a trillion naira was extended to the banks since September when access through the window was eased but some bankers thought it was unwise and indeed curious that the Central Bank will extend credit to banks at eleven percent interest rate at a time when deposits could command as much as 16 or even 17 percent.
“Expectedly a deluge of requests came in from the banks, some simply because they could not just sit there watching their competitors profit from a seemingly unusual handout from the lender of last resort.”
[b]The story quoted a banker who said: “All over the world, when you reach out to the lender of last resort, what you get is at a premium. But here banks were to all intents and purposes being rewarded instead of being punished.”[/b]On page 53 of the same edition, we ran a story entitled, ‘With blurred supervision, banks are back to cooking the books’. In the story, BusinessDay writes, “Declarations of bogus profits and failure to disclose toxic assets have crept into Nigeria’s banking system. And analysts, worried by the trend, say banking in the country has gone back to the old days when banks kept more than one statement of account for different purposes.
“But the understanding of many was that the Central Bank of Nigeria would be up to the task of supervising and discouraging banks from cutting corners. Information reaching BusinessDay indicates that the apex bank may have been looking the other way while banks cheated their shareholders of billions of naira.”
On Thursday, February 19, 2009, BusinessDay came out with a lead headline ‘CBN’s lax supervision set stage for irregular financial reporting’. According to the report, CBN’s laxity in effectively monitoring financial reporting by banks had put it at daggers drawn with Nigerian Accounting Standards Board (NASB) charged with the task of ensuring compliance with set standards of financial reporting in Nigeria which is in line with international accounting standards.
For instance, according to the story, analysts expressed surprise over lack of details by the banks which supply only basic information as profits, earnings, shareholders’ funds at the exclusion of important details such as unsecured consumer credits, trade finance exposure, equity markets risk, corporate lending risk, sovereign fixed income as well as significant potential for foreign currency risk as point of large scale asset and liability transactions with international counterparts.
And on Friday, February 20, 2009, the last day of the series, which was three months ahead of the end of the tenure of Soludo as CBN governor, BusinessDay predicted that he would not be reappointed and took the public through reasons he was unlikely to get a second term in office.
Quoting an advisory by Eurasia, the leading political risk research and consulting firm based in New York, the United States, BusinessDay catalogued a number of CBN’s policy somersaults, condescending statements talking up the economy and flip-flops which together with other issues have helped to dent Soludo’s chances of re-appointment.
The report reads: “Soludo’s current five-year tenure ends in May. While Soludo gained widespread international respect for his leadership in pushing banking sector reforms and a massive consolidation of the Nigerian banking system under the Obasanjo administration, his recent miscues on the direction of inflation and currency policy have left his much vaunted credibility damaged. Whoever replaces Soludo from Yar’Adua’s inner circle is likely to be more strongly market interventionist than Soludo, who had until recently been fairly neo-liberal in his policies.”
Since Sanusi sacked Erastus Akingbola of Intercontinental Bank, Cecilia Ibru of Oceanic Bank, Okey Nwosu of FinBank, Barth Ebong of Union Bank and Sebastian Adigwe of Afribank, it has become public knowledge that they were the main beneficiaries of the controversial expanded discount window, had cooked books to hoodwink the public and their shareholders and exposure to margin loans. BusinessDay foresaw the present crisis and faithfully discharged its responsibility to the public, but nobody, not even the authorities paid attention.
Who saw the bank crisis coming?
Who saw the bank crisis coming?
Monday, 24 August 2009 01:24 MAX AMUCHIE
In a much celebrated article entitled: ‘The Agenda-Setting Role of the Mass Media in the Shaping of Public Opinion’, Maxwell McCombs, a professor at the University of Texas, Austin, United States notes: “The power of the news media to set a nation’s agenda, to focus public attention on a few key public issues, is an immense and well-documented influence. Not only do people acquire factual information about public affairs from the news media, readers and viewers also learn how much importance to attach to a topic on the basis of the emphasis placed on it in the news. Newspapers provide a host of cues about the salience of the topics in the daily news – lead story on page one, other front page display, large headlines, etc. Television news also offers numerous cues about salience – the opening story on the newscast, length of time devoted to the story, etc. These cues repeated day after day effectively communicate the importance of each topic. In other words, the news media can set the agenda for the public’s attention to that small group of issues around which public opinion forms.”
The principal outlines of this influence had been sketched as far back as 1922 by Walter Lippmann in his work, ‘Public Opinion’. According to Lippmann, the news media are a primary source of pictures in our heads about the larger world of public affairs, a world that for most citizens is “out of reach, out of sight, out of mind.”
One can therefore appreciate the critical role of the media as the fourth estate of the realm, a tag that has stuck since Edmund Burke, the 19th century British parliamentarian and political philosopher assigned the fourth position to the media in a realm that comprises the executive, the legislature and the judiciary in that order. What we know about the world is largely based on what the media decide to tell us. More specifically, the result of this mediated view of the world is that the priorities of the media strongly influence the priorities of the public. Elements prominent on the media agenda become prominent in the public mind. If the media fail, the society is doomed. In BusinessDay this is taken seriously.
The agenda of a media house is found in its pattern of coverage of public issues over some period of time, a week, a month, an entire year. Over this period of time, whatever it might be, a few issues are emphasised, some receive light coverage, and many are seldom or never mentioned. It should, however, be noted that the use of the term ‘agenda’ here is purely descriptive. There is no pejorative implication that a media house like BusinessDay ‘has an agenda’ that it relentlessly pursues as a premeditated goal. The media agenda presented to the public results from countless day-to-day decisions by BusinessDay journalists and board of editors about the issues of the moment.
The beginning of this year presented a clear picture of the shape of things to come and BusinessDay seized it and foresaw the sequence of events that culminated in the sack of five chief executive officers of Nigerian banks on Friday, August 14.
For five days, February 16 to 20, BusinessDay ran a series on the Nigerian banking sector. It was a time that there was anxiety and excitement over the reappointment or otherwise of the former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Chukwuma Soludo. The professor of economics was appointed in 2004 and his coming led to consolidation in the Nigerian banking industry, an exercise that saw banks move their capital base from a paltry N2 billion to a minimum of N25 billion.
Initially, the move was criticised, but when at the end of 18 months period 25 banks scaled the huddle, consolidation was hailed as the best thing that had happened to the Nigerian banking industry.
However, for keen observers and for BusinessDay board of editors, there were challenges and miscues that needed to be addressed, questions that needed urgent answers and measures that needed to be taken to steer the Nigerian banking sector away from a path of destruction.
It has become public knowledge since the landmark decision of the sack of the five CEOs on August 14 that the huge debts totaling more than one trillion naira that crippled the five banks had to do with loans related to the capital market and the oil and gas sector.
The present governor of the CBN, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, while announcing the decision to sack the five managing directors, attributed the crisis in the banking sector to a failure of regulation over time. Long before then, BusinessDay had recognised the nexus between the margin loan crisis and weak regulation.
The paper’s lead story on Tuesday, February 17, 2009, was entitled: ‘How regulatory failure created margin loan crisis’. BusinessDay wrote: “A failure of regulatory oversight by the monetary authorities, charged with the responsibility to monitor and supervise how banks lend and disburse loans in the financial system, has been identified for the massive margin loan crisis hanging over the banking industry.
“The banking regulator, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is believed to have taken its eye off the ball while a number of banks moved recklessly into the capital market to perpetrate unwholesome practices designed and calculated to shore up the value of their shares in the capital market.”
We further went to report that the CBN only moved to play its oversight role after the crisis had deepened, and even when it did, its measures were targeted at general monetary concerns.
The next day, BusinessDay’s lead story was ‘Outrage as CBN lends to some banks at 11 percent’. The story reads: “The Central Bank’s expanded discount window through which it acts as lender of the last resort to the nation’s banks was opened a bit wider some months ago but access was initially fixed at an outrageously low eleven percent per annum.
“Almost a trillion naira was extended to the banks since September when access through the window was eased but some bankers thought it was unwise and indeed curious that the Central Bank will extend credit to banks at eleven percent interest rate at a time when deposits could command as much as 16 or even 17 percent.
“Expectedly a deluge of requests came in from the banks, some simply because they could not just sit there watching their competitors profit from a seemingly unusual handout from the lender of last resort.”
The story quoted a banker who said: “All over the world, when you reach out to the lender of last resort, what you get is at a premium. But here banks were to all intents and purposes being rewarded instead of being punished.”
On page 53 of the same edition, we ran a story entitled, ‘With blurred supervision, banks are back to cooking the books’. In the story, BusinessDay writes, “Declarations of bogus profits and failure to disclose toxic assets have crept into Nigeria’s banking system. And analysts, worried by the trend, say banking in the country has gone back to the old days when banks kept more than one statement of account for different purposes.“But the understanding of many was that the Central Bank of Nigeria would be up to the task of supervising and discouraging banks from cutting corners. Information reaching BusinessDay indicates that the apex bank may have been looking the other way while banks cheated their shareholders of billions of naira.”
On Thursday, February 19, 2009, BusinessDay came out with a lead headline ‘CBN’s lax supervision set stage for irregular financial reporting’. According to the report, CBN’s laxity in effectively monitoring financial reporting by banks had put it at daggers drawn with Nigerian Accounting Standards Board (NASB) charged with the task of ensuring compliance with set standards of financial reporting in Nigeria which is in line with international accounting standards.
For instance, according to the story, analysts expressed surprise over lack of details by the banks which supply only basic information as profits, earnings, shareholders’ funds at the exclusion of important details such as unsecured consumer credits, trade finance exposure, equity markets risk, corporate lending risk, sovereign fixed income as well as significant potential for foreign currency risk as point of large scale asset and liability transactions with international counterparts.
[b]And on Friday, February 20, 2009, the last day of the series, which was three months ahead of the end of the tenure of Soludo as CBN governor, BusinessDay predicted that he would not be reappointed and took the public through reasons he was unlikely to get a second term in office.[/b]Quoting an advisory by Eurasia, the leading political risk research and consulting firm based in New York, the United States, BusinessDay catalogued a number of CBN’s policy somersaults, condescending statements talking up the economy and flip-flops which together with other issues have helped to dent Soludo’s chances of re-appointment.
The report reads: “Soludo’s current five-year tenure ends in May. While Soludo gained widespread international respect for his leadership in pushing banking sector reforms and a massive consolidation of the Nigerian banking system under the Obasanjo administration, his recent miscues on the direction of inflation and currency policy have left his much vaunted credibility damaged. Whoever replaces Soludo from Yar’Adua’s inner circle is likely to be more strongly market interventionist than Soludo, who had until recently been fairly neo-liberal in his policies.”
Since Sanusi sacked Erastus Akingbola of Intercontinental Bank, Cecilia Ibru of Oceanic Bank, Okey Nwosu of FinBank, Barth Ebong of Union Bank and Sebastian Adigwe of Afribank, it has become public knowledge that they were the main beneficiaries of the controversial expanded discount window, had cooked books to hoodwink the public and their shareholders and exposure to margin loans. BusinessDay foresaw the present crisis and faithfully discharged its responsibility to the public, but nobody, not even the authorities paid attention.

fizzybaba:
given the number of confirmed attendees, i suggest we make effort to publicise this thread.

the plentier, the merrier

May Allah make it easy

Which other publicity? It has graced the home-page already?

walelamina:
Thats Really gr8 and thats one of Wt Allah has saked us to do,,,I am a muslim and i stay at Ajah,,,thomas Estate,,,i wud actually suggest you do it in your house,,,,mama cass is not the best for us to gather,,,we cant pray there if after the iftar,,,do u get mi point,,,ramadan karrem

VI is more reasonable. Ajah traffic is hellish. It will be inconvenient for majority of people.
There are two mosques around that area where we can conveniently say our prayers: We have a mosque at 13th floor, Zenon house and another at the back of Zenon house. This is just opposite Mama Cass.

sheriffman:
Jarus noticed u were online pls how can i start a post and the topic to be displayed on the home page.

pls sorry if u r reading dis i know it's not related 2 d topic but i jst need some help.

tanx 4 your understanding

You can't. Not even I, a moderator, can. Only the Admin(Seun) and Supermod(Mukina) can.
You may therefore suggest a topic for homepage here: https://www.nairaland.com/nigeria/topic-183675.0.html
If the home-paging authorities are OK with it, it will grace the home page.

Bashbaba:
Bro Jarus, are u from Offa?

Is Obama the president of US?

mikeansy:
Oh you did not know the noise was single handedly started by you know who.
Financial Times and Guardian UK were his first stops.

These media outfits interviewed him and he spoke his mind. Did he call a press conference to 'single handedly make moise'?

mikeansy:
Of course the CBN figures will corroborate what the CBN Governor wants to say!!!

If you have any contrary figure, let's have it.

Good input from Fizzybaba there.
But I don't think 3 hours is feasible. Some of us close at work 5pm and need to put one or two things in place. I think 6-7.45pm is OK.(I hope the Hajias will understand for those that are married )
I will modify the program for your suggestion now.

No financial contribution, but if anybody voluntarily feels like contributing, it will be accepted.

vikiviko:
Garba Lawal is the most accomplished from the northern extraction.

Tijani Babangida?

Andre Uweh:
Rashidi Yekini is from the West. He grew up in the North and started his career from the North.

The Kwara question again: Rashidi Yekinni is a Yoruba from Kwara, and Kwara is officially north. There is a difference between North and Hausa/Fulani. I'm also a yoruba northerner.

Drogba

olanajim:
Will it be weekly or just saturdays? If that is the case, it would be four times in the Ramadan,

Can you please explain further on the plan Jarus?

No, not weekly. Just one-off.

When Obafemi Martins hit the global football stage in 2002, not a few people were ready to put their money on his potentials. International football analysts were already tipping him as the next best thing to come out of Africa, some tagged him the new George Weah. Unfortunately, years later, he did not live up to expectation.

With what appears to be a resurgence in Germany, some people(ironically, non-Nigerians) believe he was sacrificed for Owen at Newcastle and his potentials not fully utilized.

Now he has two beautiful goals in as many matches, coming on as a sub in both matches.

The question is: Is this a flash in the pan or is Martins back?

Time shall tell.

In Lagos, Cars are already running on water . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .during heavy downpour!

I hereby formally announce arrangement for Nairalanders Iftaar(Joint breaking of fast):

DATE: Friday, Ramadan 7/August 28
TIME 6.00-7.45PM: Convergence starts 6:00pm
VENUE: Mama Cass Restaurant, opposite Zenon House, by Eko Hotel roundabout, Ajose Adeogun street,VI. If you are coming by public transport, from Obalende or CMS board a bus to Eko hotel and stop at final bus stop(Eko hotel roundabout). The venue is just few metres to the roundabout.
PROGRAMS:
-6.00-6.10: Arrival/Convergence/Seating
-6.10-6.15: Opening Remarks (Moderator)
-6.15-6.30: Faces behind the IDs (Introduction: Real names, occupation, marital status etc)
-6.30-6.45: Short sermon( Topic: Islamic brotherhood. Anybody to discuss)
-6.45:6.55: Pre-Mongrib Iftaar(Dates, fruits, water etc)
-6.55-7.10: Monghrib
-7.10-7.40: Real Iftaar(Food be served by Mama Cass) with discussions going side by side
-7.40-7.45: Dispersal

CONFIRMED ATTENDEES:
Jarus
oyb
javalove
abbeydot
sheuzee
yemi22
alimat2
ajibawealt
wholex
Fizzybaba
Biliamin
Luqmangiw
Igbalajobi
Aremugangan
Igbalajobi


Need more info? Do not hesitate to call me on 08061198625.

NB: Since this topic has been 'home-paged', let us interprete some Islamic terms used here to the non-Muslims who may just be curious. Iftaar means breaking of fast. Monghrib is sunset salat(prayer).

[quote author=becomrich. link=topic=313827.msg4409747#msg4409747 date=1251094751]ogun, oyo and delta have more branches than anambra[/quote]Do you know more than Soludo? The man that has statistics of Nigerian banks in his head speaks, and you are disproving him without any concrete evidence.

@topic,
This topic is misleading. At this point, this is not 'the speech at last' that concerns Nigerians. Just a regular speech.

He's being a patriot. Check my last posts to view my reasons which I have detailed in other threads. Got no time to keep repeating myself

jacobs123:
how many of his critics can make the declaration above in their jobs. how any bank CEOs can say this? how many of those traders who call themselves bank marketers can say this. You find bankers going before credit risk comiittee to justify loans that will go bad because they've collected some money. I'm sure we have bankers on this forum and they understand what i'm talking about. Is that not one of the reasons why a banking officer in marketing may be living larger than an assistant manager in operations?

Sanusi is a thorough-bred professional and a conservative banker with strong regard for the ethics and ethos of the profession and strongly believe you have to play by the rules. His colleagues that prefer to jump rules know him with this. One defender of Cecilia Ibru even shot himself in the foot, carelessly revealing how Cecilia Ibru and co raised N2.5Billion to stop the choice of Sanusi as CBN governor? If she didn't have any skeleton in her cupboard, why was she afraid of Sanusi becoming CBN governor? She knew Sanusi, being a co-CEO, was well aware of their unholy activities. It's like assuming all indicators pointing to the emergence of a person like Gani Fawehinmi as president of Nigeria, and the thieving politicians doing all their best to stop it, knowing full well that they are in trouble if a straightforward man like Gani becomes president. This is what I read of Cecilia's actions.
Sanusi's conservative, play-by-the-rule posture to banking is well known to other CEOs and some of them made attempts to smear him while at FBN, most prominent of which was the 'de-marketing' accusation Akingbola and his Intercontinental bank hurled at him early this year. What was termed de-marketing was Sanusi's non-hesitation to speak out about the unethical practices some of his colleagues were engaging in. For those who don't know, Sanusi has always been an outspoken, fearless critic from his days at UBA. This I mentioned in my article on him: http://www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php?id=147240%20-

I have passionately defended Sanusi on and beyond NL as if I have been paid to do PR job for him, but my belief in Sanusi is purely research-induced. The reasons are two-fold: One, this man competed with the South's best in the private sector and rose to become the GMD of one of Africa's largest financial group. If he can stand his own against ivy-league-schools-trained professionals from the south in the private sector, who says he can't perform at the apex bank? This was why my own point has been that don't let us dismiss this man just because of his tribe and religion. Let's see what he has to offer. Two, I have read more than 30 of his writings,people's rejoinders to his writings and his rejoinders to other people's writing(I have a special folder for them on my system), and I have formed opinion about his personality. The summary of who I see him to be, from his writings, is that he's a fearless, straightforward disciplinarian that can look at anybody in the eyes and tell him/her what he feels is the truth. I must however state that I have one or two reservations about his personality, but I think he has realized this as he stated in one interview he granted a Nigerian newspaper about a month ago, when asked what he had learnt in life, that he has come to realize  that he's not necessarily right at all times, and to be soft with people of differing opinions(This was my major reservation I had about him before. He was, to me, too harsh in his choice of words when criticizing, especially as contained in two of his article: Afenifere: A Syllabus of Error and Identity, Political Ethics And Parochialism: Engagement With Ja’far Adam.

Passionate as I am on the side of Sanusi, I am not given to blind following. For example, I pick holes in his decision to publish that debtors list without taking his time to check the accuracy. That the list contains typos and other inaccuracies is public knowledge. That, to me, is a costly mistake and inexcusable.

Other arguments against Sanusi don't hold any water, to me. Some are plain balderdash(like the Sanusi-is-after-Adeboye's-friends argument,the he-BOFIA-is-a-military-decree argument,the northernization argument, the he-has-no-business-being-CBN-governor argument, the he-did-not-have-a-Phd argument) while some are at least reasonable(like the he-should-have-sent-the-CEOs-on-compulsory-leave argument, the he-has-good-intention-but-being-too-draconian-in-his-approach argument)
The argument I found most nauseating is the 'northern agenda' argument. If there is any northern agenda, Sanusi is the last tool they can use to hatch such idea. I can put my life on it that this Sanusi move is not northern agenda.

I have spent too much time and energy discussing the Sanusi tsunami on and off NL and I'm getting tired.