I stumbled on an article by one Mr. Ahmed Sule ( FCA). It is so disappointing to read. It is nothing but a regurgitation of the same well-worn World Bank blame game. There was not one single alternative policy prescription other than the usual finger pointing and externalization of our problem. Expectedly, Mr. Sule latched on the article in which the World Bank gave its analysis of the Tinubu reform, as the bogey-man. He did not even make an attempt to provide his own counter-point to the World Bank. He failed to provide his position on the Tinubu economic agenda other than a listing of the pains it has inflicted on the populace. The president in his inaugural address stated clearly that his proposed economic reform agenda was going to be excruciatingly painful. He stated unequivocally that he was going to remove fuel subsidy and that he was going to float the currency. He did not trick the electorate. He also told the citizens to render their judgement on the performance of his reform policy with their votes in 2027. Mr. Sule in his social media post pretended as if our economic nightmare began with or was precipitated by the Tinubu regime. He had nothing to say about our profligate and obscene economic mismanagement dating back to the mid 1970s-early 80s during which we frittered away our oil windfall like drunken sailors on a pirate ship.
World Bank bashing has been our default excuse for our collective failure since the 1986 IMF SAP debacle. We focused on SAP rather than its predicate. We never asked ourselves the hard question about what we did wrong with all the stupendous oil windfall that accrued to our country, and why we ended ended up prostrate in 1986 crawling on our belly to the World Bank and IMF for a bail out.
“Have we forgotten the commonwealth fund that was proposed by Sister Ngozi Okonjo Eweala during the President Jonathan regime to put away our excess oil revenue for the rainy day but rejected by the governors, or the hubris of young General Gowon who in the 70s declared that our country’s problem was not lack of money but how to spend it? Now we all have to endure the lean years we didn’t make provision for, in order for us to survive and be here when hopefully the years of abundance come back again.“
The World Bank does not force itself on any country. Countries choose membership of the World Bank out of their free will. They usually approach the World Bank for low interest loan when they are totally out of luck and option, unable to access finance through the open financial market because they have mismanaged their credit worthiness. That was the position Nigeria found itself in 1986. Even after General Obasanjo was able to get a big chunk of our debt written off by the World Bank and other multilateral financial institutions we were indebted to, did we take advantage of that? No, we didn’t. Our politicians continued unabatedly to plunder our commonwealth and they still do.
The Bible says the debtor is a slave to his creditor. So, when countries like Nigeria have run out of options and are forced by their desolate and desperate circumstances to crawl on their bellies for financial life wire, of course like the slave described in the Bible to their creditors, they are forced to go on a forced diet (conditionalities) in order to access the low interest loan and sometimes outright grants that the World Bank offers due to the “generosity” of the donor members.
We need to know that donors do not donate their fund to the poor out of philanthropy and benevolence. Foreign aids are a tool of promoting national hegemonic advantage. There are no free lunches in international relations. U. S and Europe are not funding the Ukraine war necessarily because of their love for the Ukrainians. They are dropping billions of ammunition and weapons of death into Ukraine to fight Russia because it advances their geopolitical agenda against Russia. It also creates opportunity for the military industrial complex to dispose their unused weapons, to test new one and create jobs in their local economies. We will be wise to understand that our economic success lies with us doing the hard work of national building and advancing our economic interest in an amoral, survival of the fittest, rigged global economic system. We should never again put our country in the position in which external financial institutions dictate or have a veto on our economic policies. China can tell the World Bank to go to hell with its economic prescriptions. In fact China has created its own alternative to the World Bank. As we romance China, we would be wise to learn that China like the West before it is not a benevolent Father Christmas doling out free money for its Silk Road project.
“The capital asset of the “World Bank” is minuscule compared to those of global behemoths like the JP Morgan Chase, the China Bank of Industry, or the Bank of America. The world number one bank, China Industrial and Commercial Bank has total assets of $6.3 trillion. By comparison, the World Bank had just about $200 billion of assets under management. The World Bank would not rank among the top 50 banks in the world. In fact, there is a debate whether the term bank can truly be applied to the World Bank.“
The phrase “ World Bank” is in fact a gross abuse, misuse and exaggeration of the financial muscle of the “ World Bank”. When the phrase World Bank was used at its founding it represented an extreme case of hubris. The capital asset of the “World Bank” is minuscule compared to those of global behemoths like the JP Morgan Chase, the China Bank of Industry, or the Bank of America. The world number one bank, China Industrial and Commercial Bank has total assets of $6.3 trillion. By comparison, the World Bank had just about $200 billion of assets under management. The World Bank would not rank among the top 50 banks in the world. In fact, there is a debate whether the term bank can truly be applied to the World Bank.
There is therefore the tendency by failed economies and misinformed economic analysts to use the World Bank as the bogeyman, “the devil that made them do it”. We can externalize and blame the World Bank all we want, until we owe our economic misfortune and our culpability for it, we will only be spinning wheel stuck in the muck.
Those who are condemning the Tinubu economic reform policy, which is neither perfect nor the silver bullet by any stretch of imagination, should go beyond finger-pointing and Monday morning quarterbacking. They should show us their alternative economy prescriptions. They should tell us how Nigeria succeeds economically by continuing with the failed policy of fuel subsidy and of artificially juicing and propping up our forex with high interest loan we could not afford so that the oil subsidy and forex mafias can prosper like bandits while mortgaging the future of generations of Nigerians yet unborn.
You had oil subsidy mafia making billions of dollars by simply pushing unverifiable paper of millions of PMS import which never made it to our shores and the a huge portion of what ultimately makes it to the market is smuggled out of the country for a tidy windfall profit. You also had the forex mafia who bought forex at CBN subsidized rate purportedly to import capital equipment and essential commodities only to turn around to sell the same forex to their foot soldiers in the Bureau de Change at stupendous, huge profit margin. If that is not the definition of madness, please tell us what is.
In his dream, Pharaoh is standing by the Nile when seven fat cows come up out of the river, followed by seven thin cows that eat the fat cows. In response Pharaoh stored away excess grains in the seven years of abundance to sustain his nation during the seven lean years that would follow. Our situation is the reverse of the Pharaoh situation. We failed over the decades, especially in the heady days of the high global oil market price to save money for the rainy day. Have we forgotten the commonwealth fund that was proposed by Sister Ngozi Okonjo Eweala during the President Jonathan regime to put away our excess oil revenue for the rainy day but rejected by the governors, or the hubris of young General Gowon who in the 70s declared that our country’s problem was not lack of money but how to spend it? Now we all have to endure the lean years we didn’t make provision for, in order for us to survive and be here when hopefully the years of abundance come back again.
There are no guarantees that President Tinubu’s reform agenda will do the trick, but we are like an extremely critical patient who got into a bad auto accident after a night of excessive drinking and is now on the ER (emergency room) and the doctors are doing everything to safe his life. We have no option than to hold on tight for our dear life, bear the pain of the poking and the electric shock applied by the Defibrillators and hope and pray that it works.
We must continue in our civic responsibility and obligation to hold the president accountable to live by example, the life of austerity his policy has forced Nigerians to live under. He should tackle and hold people accountable for past endemic corruption that is still rife under his administration. He should cut down on the profligacy that his administration has been accused of. He should rein in the unsustainably high cost of governance and the bloated bureaucracy that supports it. We are still waiting for the cabinet reshuffle to prune out dead wood and non-performing ministers and heads of agencies. He should prioritise competence over political patronage. He should constantly review the performance of his economic reforms agenda against the result in the real economy where the citizens live, and make adjustments when and where necessary. Those are the kind of debates we should be having not this constant whining and blaming the World Bank.
The true victims of the Nigerian elites, who are the one on social media doing most of the complaining, are the poor masses who did not benefit a thing in the days of economic abundance and the Nigerian youths who have known nothing but tear, pain, sorrow, dashed hope and bleak future all of their life. Those of us who benefitted from the years of abundance should prioritize making the needed sacrifice so that our grandchildren can take over a country they have a chance to rebuild, than this constant complaining. If truth be told many of us cannot with a good conscience claim innocence in the plunder of our economy. Our generation’s obligation now is to make the last sacrifice to save this country for the future generations. Time is running out. We will never be able to hand over to the next generation, a country better than we met it. We are constantly looking back at the old western region era of Chief Awolowo with great nostalgia. That should tell us all we need to know about our abject failure.
Externalizing the blame for our economic mismanagement to the World Bank is therefore, not a viable economic prescription.
Adewale Alonge, PhD: Founder& President, Africa-Diaspora Partnership for Empowerment & Development (ADPED). www.adped.org
