So, there was a time when the Naira actually kept appreciating against the dollar year on year. Before 2008, and preceded by huge external debts.
There were enough laws to prevent this indiscriminate printing of money through the so called ways and means.
The executive, the legislature, the media and civil society, through ignorance and / or abdication, all conspired together to break the extant laws guiding government borrowing from the Central Bank. Now, the chickens have come home to roost and we’re all feeling the pain.
We can only hope to have learnt our lessons. But do we ever do that?
We’ve always had warnings from knowledgeable people fall on deaf ears. And those who have COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY but end up messing us up hardly ever pay the price, individually or collectively.
Shouldn’t there be personal sanctions for breaking the law to this extent? Should the law be such a toothless bulldog? Then what’s the point?
What do we need to do to prevent such reckless abandon and needless pain in future?
Go to sleep on all these?
Related.
*THANK YOU SANUSI.*
Why Tinubu Shouldn’t Be Blamed For Nigerian’s Economic Hardship – Sanusi Lamido.
*He said everything in Nigeria in the last eight years was done with debts.
Former Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi, said it would be unfair for him to criticise President Bola Tinubu over the country’s economic hardship Nigerians.
Mr Sanusi, a former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), speaking during a virtual religious event on Sunday, said Nigerians who expected him to speak about the economic hardship deliberately wanted him to oppose the president.
He explained that he had to deviate from the religious theme of the event to remind Nigerians about his stands on the badly managed economic policies of the immediate past administration of Muhammadu Buhari.
He said the Buhari administration ignored his advice on how to take Nigeria out of its economic woes.
Mr Sanusi said economists with a fair sense of reasoning know that the current administration has made the right decision (fuel subsidy removal) to save Nigeria from the bondage of debts dug by the past administration.
“I have been, over the years, talked about the pending crisis ahead of the current economic hardship. Any economist who has studied monetary policy in the last eight years knows that Nigerians will fall into this difficult situation.
“The difficult situation Nigerians are facing is just the beginning (if the right decision is not put in place) because Nigeria is not exceptional; such situations happened in Germany, Zimbabwe, Uganda, and Venezuela.
“The previous administration has turned adamant about our appeal for corrective measures (on the economic policy). I have said in the presence of the now sitting president in Kaduna state, any politician who tells you that things will be easy, don’t vote for him because he is lying. People merely dismissed my advisory as a political statement.
“If I am to be fair and just to President Bola Tinubu, he is not to blame for the current hardship; for eight years, we were living on a fake lifestyle with huge debt from foreign and domestic debts. The Central Bank of Nigeria owes over N30 trillion, which resulted in debt service surpassing 100 per cent.
“I can’t join other Nigerians criticising Tinubu on the current economic hardship, and I am not saying he is a saint free from wrongdoing, but in this current economic situation, President Tinubu is not to be blamed. I will also speak if I see any wrong economic policy of the Tinubu administration in the future.
“It’s injustice for anyone to blame the Tinubu administration for the current economic hardship because there is no other alternative than the removal of the fuel subsidy. After all, Nigeria cannot even afford to pay the subsidy.
“(In the last eight years), the Central Bank continues to print more money, and the Naira continue to depreciate. There is too much naira in circulation because the CBN is printing the currency without restraint.
“The economy was poorly managed, and they are not willing to take advice; in the last eight years, apart from sycophancy, nothing has been done; those sycophants are those buying the dollar at the rate of N400 and selling it at the rate of N600 to N700.
“A boy who has no record of service has a private jet and owns houses in Dubai and England just because he is buying Dollar at so so a rate and selling them, Mr Sanusi said.
He said everything in Nigeria in the last eight years is done on debt, lamenting that no country will survive in that economic policy.
“I can only plead with the people to endure the hardship, and those who have the means to help the downtrodden should do so.
“I am also pleading with commoners to live according to their earnings; we must not peg our lives above our earnings in this difficult situation where people are looking for what to eat, the former Kano Emir said.
This is late. People like him should have spoken out. Maybe he was cowered by fear but now he’s spreading the guilt net to include me. I won’t accept it because I had no idea that CBN was just recklessly printing currency notes not backed by wealth or income. People like him who knew should have sounded the alarm. They might have succeeded in reducing the slide and impunity. But he kept mum. I doubt the authenticity of his argument because right now nobody will challenge his story. His conclusions cannot be stressed or verified because the other side will keep mum while he attempts to exculpate the present clueless administration. He wants to take credit for Obasanjo’s economic policies which were spearheaded by the DG of the WTO
He did speak out. Many others also did. Including Governor Obaseki of Edo state. But how many voices do we hear?
If you hadn’t seen it here, did you know he said the one above?
Here’s the Obaseki one I just referred to.
It would simply be labelled as opposition talk.
So many people are saying very valid and helpful things, but how many voices can most people hear? How do they even know what and who is worth listening to? That’s not anybody’s fault. It’s just the way life is.
I attempt here to keep record of similar notable high value contributions that may not be getting the due awareness they deserve.
Even me, how many do I have the time to find?
The effort is worth it though.
I remember Obaseki saying the FG was just printing money. I also heard Soludo on the Channels TV. Maybe his first attempt was too muted?