Lamentations of Jeremiah and Songs of Solomon

How was your Sallah? If you had a good one — bar the tragic news of the death of 717 pilgrims in Saudi Arabia — I am very happy for you. But for the ram sellers, this was one of the worst in their history. Those who invested in the ram business ahead of the Eid Al-Adha celebrations are not smiling to the bank. They had never seen such low patronage in recent years, and for the first time rams were selling at prices lower than the previous year’s. Those who took loans for the business are in debt, unsure of when and how to pay back. Those whose livelihoods depend on the annual ram sale — like farmers who harvest and sell seasonal produce — are in deep trouble.

What happened? There is no need to ask: the economy is in a mess. Money has virtually disappeared from the system. Only a jaundiced observer will say there is no cause for alarm. We have been hit on all fronts. Revenue is dwindling. Debts are mounting. Historical leakages through corruption and mindless waste have come back to haunt us. Only God knows how much money was expended on the 2015 elections by politicians, both at state and federal levels. It is not a coincidence that most states could not pay salaries before and after the elections. It is not a coincidence that many projects have stalled. The ram seller is just a victim of a problem he did not create.

No doubt, President Muhammadu Buhari inherited a mountain of problems and a dysfunctional system. He inherited security problems, notably the insurgency in the north and kidnappings, mostly in the south. He inherited the age-old accountability issues, with sad tales of corruption and waste staring us in the face all day. He inherited political problems, having come through an acrimonious election. He inherited economic challenges, with low oil prices, huge local and foreign debts, unpaid salaries, mounting subsidy bills, forex scarcity and liquidity squeeze in the financial system combining to pile pain on millions of Nigerians.

We have been reading the Lamentations of Jeremiah since Buhari assumed office, but when are we going to start singing the Songs of Solomon? To the uninitiated, Lamentations of Jeremiah is full of heartbreaking weeping and gnashing of teeth. Songs of Solomon, in contrast, is full of heart-warming poetry of ecstasy. Nigerians, for all their endeavour, need something to cheer them up. They need a balm to soothe their wounds. We have been groaning and moaning for ages. When will these bitter tears be wiped off our face? When shall the average man, the average woman break forth in jubilant singing and dancing? What is Buhari doing to take away our pains?

On security, Buhari certainly “hit the ground running” on assumption of office and got the needed support from the US government which had turned its back on Nigeria under President Goodluck Jonathan over reports of human right abuses by the Nigerian military. Despite Buhari’s efforts, there is no victory in sight. Boko Haram has not been less deadly. Curiously, 117 persons were killed in Maiduguri last weekend and it did not warrant much reaction or media coverage. In August, Buhari gave a three-month deadline to the military to end the insurgency and Tukur Buratai, army chief, said it would end “in a matter of days”. I was not that confident.

I do not expect the insurgency to end in the next two years, basically because of the nature of terrorism and the incredible resilience of Boko Haram, but many things are obviously changing. At least soldiers are no longer complaining about lack of equipment and embezzlement of their allowances. We are no longer hearing stories of Nigerian soldiers making “tactical manoeuvre” into Cameroon and being rescued and handed back to Nigerian authorities. But kidnappings are back in full force, which is an indictment on our security agencies. Agreed, insecurity is not Buhari’s making — but he was elected to tackle it and end the lamentations.

Buhari has yet to unveil a comprehensive plan to tackle corruption. Even the advisory committee he set up is yet to be inaugurated, months after the composition was announced. We really don’t know how he wants to go about it beyond what we are used to: ICPC or EFCC charging people to court and cases going on for decades. There is the well-known talk about “body language” — which is very, very critical to any anti-graft war. However, I guess Buhari himself understands that the justice system needs some tweaking. We need some prison reform. We need public enlightenment and moral re-orientation. But you can be sure corruption will not be fashionable under Buhari.

Politically, Buhari has so far failed to heal the wounds he inherited. Nigeria was sharply and bitterly divided along partisan and regional lines during the elections. You cannot blame him for that — that is essentially the way we are in Nigeria — but as a leader, he has to make a conscious effort to heal the wounds and bring us under one canopy. Political appointments must be balanced and no part of Nigeria should be excluded as punishment for their political choices. As I have often said, Buhari needs to build a broad-based coalition and national consensus in his bid to turn Nigeria around. This cannot never be achieved when his supporters encourage him to pursue vendetta.

My biggest worry, by far, is the state of the economy. Buhari inherited monumental challenges. We are in a deep mess — the ram sellers will tell you so. Those whose salaries are being delayed will tell you so. Pension managers who have not been getting remittances from employers will tell you so. Importers who can no longer access forex will tell you so. Businesses that are accessing loans at exorbitant rates will tell you so. Banks that are running short of liquidity and reportedly downsizing will tell you so. Nigeria’s debt managers will tell you so. We can pretend all we want, but the economy needs an emergency rescue plan.

And let us be plain about this: there will never be easy ways out. We are dealing with serious monetary and fiscal crises. Measures adopted so far by Buhari have neither been comprehensive nor reassuring. Indeed, he is yet to tap into the enormous goodwill that ushered him into office. Most analysts and investors are complaining about the lack of a clear-cut policy direction, blamed mainly on his failure to constitute his cabinet nearly four months after taking over from President Goodluck Jonathan. Nigeria is being downgraded by international rating agencies which many investors rely on to take their decisions. Yet we need billions of dollars in fresh investments like yesterday.

The monetary policy committee (MPC) of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has warned that we are heading for recession in 2016 if “proactive steps” are not taken by the federal government to revive key sectors of the “fragile economy”. The GDP recorded slow growth in the second quarter — and I add that it would even be worse in the third quarter. The non-payment of salaries has reduced consumer demand, the committee said, while the demand pressure on forex remained “significant” as oil prices continue to decline. The banking sector performance would further worsen, the MPC further said, citing the implementation of the Treasury Single Account as a threat to liquidity.

How do we tackle these enormous challenges? We need a clear Buhari plan, understandable and digestible, with milestones and timelines. His party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), told us before the election that they had a plan. But civil servants are the ones running the show now in the absence of ministers. Unfortunately, the civil servants know nothing about the APC plan and owe Nigerians no explanations. After all, they did not campaign and did not make any promises during electioneering. It is Buhari and APC that made promises. We’re losing time. We’re losing goodwill by the minute.  When shall we move from the Lamentations of Jeremiah to the Songs of Solomon?

AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…

STAMPEDE SHOCKER

The Hajj tragedy that claimed 717 lives on Thursday is so sad and devastating, but this will hopefully offer the Saudi authorities and the entire Muslim world an opportunity to have a second look at the conduct of the annual Islamic rite. Crowd control is always a challenge in a large gathering of any sort, more so when you are dealing with 3 million pilgrims from over 200 countries and different cultures, with varying degrees of education, exposure and maturity. I am still inclined to think this latest tragedy was mainly an accident but largely avoidable with better planning. Condolences.

POLIO POLEAXED?

Something to cheer: Nigeria is going to be polio-free soon. No new cases have been reported in one year, though it takes three years to attain the polio-free status. Tribute to those who persuaded northern religious leaders in 2003 that the vaccine was not designed to sterile Muslim women and curtail the biological growth of Islam. Tribute to courageous vaccinators murdered by Boko Haram in 2013. Tribute to Bill Gates who spent billions fighting the nervous/paralysis disease in a foreign country. Tribute to the governments of Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua and Goodluck Jonathan for their devotion to the cause. Progress!

CHANGING GOALPOSTS

When former President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua reversed the sale of refineries in June 2007 and reverted ownership to the NNPC, we were told in plain language that all the refineries would start functioning by December of the same year. That was eight years ago. The promise is yet to be fulfilled. A few months ago, we were told that as a result of President Muhammadu Buhari’s body language, the refineries are now encouragingly functioning at 60% capacity. But on Friday, Ibe Kachikwu, the NNPC GMD, said “as at today, the average refining performance is 30 per cent”. All within three months? Wonderful.

BOKO BACKERS

Supporters of former President Goodluck Jonathan had a theory about the menace of Boko Haram: they point accusing fingers at elements in the north as the backers of the insurgency which, we must admit, eventually dealt a deadly blow on Jonathan’s presidency. The Nigerian army has now come up with a similar allegation: that certain elements in Borno state have been benefitting from the insurgency and are holding clandestine meetings and employing the services of some marabouts to make sure the war doesn’t end. The army merely issued a warning, though, without making arrests over such a grievous allegation. Baffling.