Nigerian economy is
fast slipping into a state of comatose; urgent measures must be taken to
salvage the situation else I don’t think we can survive till 2019 at this rate
under the fist and grip of President Buhari.
Only those with
plenty reserve of cash will not feel the pain, anguish and poverty ravaging
Nigeria since the assumption of office by President Muhammadu Buhari.
President Buhari is
supposedly a man of uncommon courage with sincere passion to eradicate
corruption out of Nigerian system, a lot has been said, debates and schools of
thoughts on his style of governance but one critical yardstick used to assess
the progress of any government is how buoyant or viable its economy is doing.
Nigeria economy
under ex- President Jonathan despite all the allegations of corruption was
adjudged as the best and biggest in Africa at that time, well, at that time is
just some 9 months ago. One will wonder what suddenly happed to the biggest
economy of 9 months ago, now under President Buhari, what is he doing wrong
that seems to make everything wrong. This question is not so hard to answer as
I think.
All progressive
Congress (APC), the party that Buhari rode to power came up with powerful and
un-resistible promises during electioneering campaign and even gave timelines to the delivery of
their promises, even though some of those promises were denied shortly after
they came to power and no single one has been achieved since the time they came
to power, APC did not stop at promising Nigerians heaven on earth but mocked
and knocked every achievements of Ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, as many can
see some of Buhari’s ministers are now praising the achievements of Jonathan
they once mocked and knocked.
Buhari dissociated
himself from numerous campaign promises, his only focus is fighting the alleged
corrupt people, he is much interested in fighting and fighting without setting
up strong economic team to deliver dividend of democracy to Nigerians.
Another problem is
that the economy might not change from its current status if President Buhari
continues to put himself in a “god” status which makes his ministers, advisers
and stakeholders to fear to talk or give him wise counsels, one UK tabloid The
Ecomonist, who claimed that they endorsed Buhari also wrote that it seems he is
making the same mistake as his first chance to rule Nigeria in 1984 when he
toppled democratic system through coup and came to power.
The state of
economy now and that of 1984 of Buhari reign of terror have a lot of semblance,
how can President Buhari promised to make N1 equal to $1 before elections and 9
months down the line, $1 is equal to over N400, what is the future of Nigerian
economy? Everybody is groaning under severe pain, the purported budget of
change suddenly turned to budget of shame and corruption.
Buhari who’s aura and accolades includes
integrity and had contested 4 different times surprisingly does not have any
sound economic plan to pivot the nation but seems his only focus is to fight
his perceived enemies under the disguise of fighting corruption not minding
what happens to the electorates that campaigned, queued in the hot sun and
blazing rain to enthrone him to power.
It is evidently
seen that President Buhari would want to cover his weakness and failure to
provide dividend of democracy to Nigerians, this has made him to hire more of
media aides to spread propaganda in the media than setting up strong economic
team and advisers, infact how can one advise a man who is not accessible and
ready to listen to anyone, this is the feelers we are getting about the person
and personality of President Buhari, his corruption fight is dead on arrival so
to speak.
The more President
Buhari tries the more distracted he becomes from real governance because, his
mission if I could put together from what I am seeing is to decimate Peoples
Democratic Party (PDP) probably because he is allergic to criticism, opposition
or quest to conquer and perpetuate himself into power than necessary against
the constitution of Nigeria like the Mugabe of this world, there is no
assurance that Nigerians will have that power to change Buhari peradventure
things remains the same in 2019.
I say this because,
its seems brute forces is taking its high place in the scheme of things against
those who can speak up against the several misrule of this administration,
citizens might also be subjected to such fate as time goes on because, none of
them want to be like Hero Jonathan that allowed everyone to have their say no
matter how ridiculous it may be.
President Buhari
should know better as a military trained man that, fighting too many battle and
enemies at the same time might be too risky and dangerous for him, no one is
against fight against corruption but it is too oblivious that in some aspect he
is on a revenge mission while at some other point he is fighting opposing
voices to his style of governance.
Even those who sold
Buhari to Nigerians as the messiah that will make Nigeria becomes a Dubai have
began to sing a different tune, it is no longer news that Senator Remi Tinubu,
the wife of All Progressives Congress National Leader Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu
took to the floor of the Senate to shout “This is not the change we voted for”
in another dramatic scene, our kongi, most respected and reputable noble laurel
Prof. Wole Soyinka had asked President Buhari to convoke an emergency economic
confab.
If the economy is
going in the right directions, no one will be crying and shouting hoo and ruu
for Buhari to do the right thing, we cannot sustain a government by simply
telling the whole world about how corrupt some leaders are or how many thieves
we have caught by this administration.
The worse of Buhari’s
situation is those ignoramus fellows that line themselves up on social media,
radio stations and TV outlets to defend him every now and then, they think they
are doing good job defending their saintly god, unfortunately the more they do
that the more they provoke the anger of Nigerians.
What do you want to
preach to a man sacked from his job or a man with no food or money to cater for his family because the
economy is not doing well, investors are leaving Nigeria in droves, yet we keep
seeing in the news papers everyday EFCC or DSS arrest this and that, how long are we
going to endure all this?
In the very beginning
of President Buhari, I belong to nobody and belong to everybody, every mistakes
are blamed on Jonathan and the past admin, Nigerians were playing along,
suddenly when reality began to hit people very hard due to the economic crunch,
they got back to their right senses that Jonathan is not the problem, it’s all
lies and propaganda to buy time.
They in APC failed
to use that time buying gimmicks very well by fixing one or two things that
could be of benefit to Nigerians and now nobody want to hear Jonathan as an excuse
for failure to deliver on all campaign promises.
The question once
again is if under 9 months of Buhari reign as President, Nigeria remains economically
unviable, what happens to the nation in the months ahead to 2019 that we’ll
have the opportunity to try and CHANGE him?
May God help
Nigeria.
Adelaja
Adeoye is a blogger, social and political commentator who writes from Lagos
Nigeria. Twitter Handle: @AdelajaAdeoye.
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