By Femi Kusa
I listened on 01/08/23 to analyst Mazi Onuorah in the news review by SUPERGIRL on Jordan 105.5 FM radio in Abule Egba, Lagos. Mazi Onuorha is becoming more balanced in his views. For some time now, he has been seeing some goodness in the TINUBU Administration.
On that day, the only blot he saw in President TINUBU’s broadcast was that the President did not mention his plans for the refineries. Mazi Onuorha said reactivation of the refineries was crucial for any meaningful soothing of the pains of fuel subsidy removal. Callers-in after callers-in followed Mazi Onuorha’s footsteps. One of them was a regular commentator, Alaba Alape. I agree with them. But I cannot blame President Tinubu for leaving the refineries out of his broadcast. What many people may not know is that the earliest time any of the refineries will come on board is December this year, about five months away.
Mazi Onuorha and other callers probably didn’t know that DANGOTE REFINERY may not start production until sometime next year and that Aliko Dangote may not have told us the whole truth about how far he had gone with the refinery. From my enquiries, also, Port Harcourt may start work in about December. The others must fit into a medium, or long-term, plan. But do we because of this fold our arms and not retrieve the country from the economy thieves and their mafias? What the government is doing in my view is what ROBIN HOOD did in Birmingham Forest. He took money from the thieves of society and passed it over to the poor.
We all said we wanted to restructure. The mafias stood in the way so they could continue to “eat” the federal government. As Lagos Governor, Tinubu adopted FINANCIAL FEDERALISM as a way of taking money from the Federal governments and giving it to state and local governments. That was what Nyesom Wike did in Rivers with the sales tax litigation which he won for the states. Now, Tinubu is recycling fuel subsidy to the state and local governments, and to the farms, roads, and universities.
For the first time in decades, state and local government allocations from the Federation Account jumped by an average of forty per cent. This is within the first two months of the Tinubu Administration. The states and local governments have never been as liquid and happier. Six governors accompanied the president on a one-day diplomatic shuttle to the Benin Republic, Nigeria’s Western neighbour, to felicitate with that country on its independence anniversary, two months ahead of Nigeria’s in 1960.
It is now up to the state and local governments to make necessary adjustments in their domain. Lagos State has cut by 50 per cent the fares on Lag buses and encouraged private transporters to knock off 25 per cent on all routes. Some states have raised the minimum wage from N30,000 to N40,000 a month.
Some have purchased buses to bring their staff to work and back home free of cost. Some are paying backlogs of salaries. Everywhere, something is happening. The president himself has spoken about how much of the money he has saved from fuel subsidy removal he is going to pump into the growing of rice and corn, on roads to take them to silos and from there to bring them to town.
He is also going to provide university students with buses on their campuses. He has advised the universities to not arbitrarily raise fees. Additionally, he has directed restrictions on access to student loans. His interim plans are not limited to this.
Nevertheless, the NLC and the TUC believe a nationwide strike was necessary to force the President to yield more grounds. The president reminded the Labour leaders of a court ruling which forbade them from calling a strike. Labour ignored this advice and warned all of us it claimed to be fighting for to stockpile food and medicines at home, suggesting that a showdown with the president might be long drawn.
What I find intriguing in this warning is that labour is saying with one corner of its mouth that it is fighting for us because there is no money in our hands and pockets, but is telling us with the other corner of its mouth to go and find money which we do not have, from wherever we will find it, for food and medicine stockpiles because there is going to be a collision at labour’s behest with the government.
I have been wondering how the government would wish to react to a paralysing collision. Will it throw in the towel? A weak government will do so and will never get its bearing right for the remainder of its tenure. For labour will always go for its jugular and lead it by the nose. In that case, we would have two pilots in the cockpits for the next four years. And that would mean that labour would become a senior coalition partner in government when it did not stand for elections. The only way the government can get rid of that will be through special palliatives. These may involve appointments into public offices or the agencies of government or other soft landings.
However, I doubt if the president would allow this to happen. He is not a vegetable politician. Throughout his youth, business, and political career, he has demonstrated unflagging strong will, and a firm grip on his goals. Characteristically, He said that he would not give up on fuel subsidy removal and the merger or fusion and parallel market currency exchange rates.
These are two major sectors of a 6-sector war on economy thieves and the mafias behind them. I anticipate that if Labour collides with the government, the president might rein in its leaders for contempt of court or arrest them for safe custody if the protest causes pandemonium, loss of life, damage to property or prevention of other citizens from embarking on their legitimate businesses. If that leads to more troubles, the cycle may go on. And, if in that process the President gets it right and the citizens applaud him, labour would become shamed, pulverised, and demystified.
The labour uproar must be soothing for the egos of Presidential aspirant, Atiku Abubakar, of the PDP and his LP counterpart, Peter Obi. Incidentally, Peter Obi has made no statement to suggest that he is happy with the rebellion of labour. Atiku has been generous with statements indirectly urging Labour on. He has even suggested before now that Peter Obi collaborate with him for an Atiku/Obi presidency that would give way to a Peter Obi presidency after four years. Peter Obi was the Junior member of their ticket in the 2019 Presidential election which they lost to Muhammadu Buhari whose electoral fortune was helped by Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Who would expect Atiku Abubakar to not fight back and not even instigate the NLC and TUC to cause more confusion and hardship in the hope that Nigeria will become paralysed and he would become President from the backdoor?
PALLIATIVES
I am not a PALLIATIVES person. Europe is walking out of it. Even Canada which used to house one old person in a flat now lumps about four or five together in one. I believe more in an ENABLED SOCIETY into which all citizens can plug for SELF ENABLEMENT. Every citizen should be taught to not be lazy. Even the physically challenged can be enabled to adapt. Then, there should be an IDEAS BANK where citizens can tap ideas for business and all of that. Regularly, I make such suggestions on my FACEBOOK ACCOUNT (@JOHN OLUFEMI KUSA). The latest is on how, under President TINUBU’s AGRICULTURE EMERGENCY, Nigeria can in four years begin to grow, every year, 100 billion pawpaw fruits and raise 100 billion rabbits to replace cow meat.
POOR NIGERIANS
Finally, our idea of THE POOR NIGERIAN is not well defined. Many of the people we think are poor are richer than some of us. We are deceived by their level of education, their scruffy dress, their incoherence with the English language and the POOR MAN’S MENTALITY which makes them live in shanty homes, and not in living homes. I spoke to more than 20 women who sell fruits by the roadside inhaling traffic fumes every day.
The ones who roast corn and plantain intrigued me during my investigations. The average corn they roast and sell for about N200 comes from the farm at about N50 each. If one makes an allowance for N100 to take account of transportation, charcoal fire, and “palliatives” for Kick Against Indiscipline (KAI) people to look the other way, this still leaves them with a profit of N50 on every sale. Almost all of them, sell more than 100 units every day.
At 100 units, they earn N5000 every day or about N150,000 every month. How many university graduates or some of us retirees or pensioners earn that? I will be 73 this month and not on any pension. Many distributors of palliatives would easily bypass me because my face may look fresh and shiny, and give palliatives to these persons. Who would even believe me that I, too, need palliatives?
What I have just said about the roadside corn woman is true of the pepper seller in the market. We all must eat. We must patronise them even on near ZERO NAIRA BUDGET. We are only luckier if our children are grown and have left home to struggle on their own and now live alone or with our spouses.
Already, almost everyone is adapting. Adaptation is a natural response to change. The umbrella and the raincoat help us to adapt to rainfall, the sweater to cold and the air conditioner to heat. All countries are on the move. Nigeria is no exception. It is an adaptation which solves the problems of change, not necessarily feeding bottles from any government.
We have always been on the move, and we have always beautifully adapted. In 1944, Pa Michael Imoudu led the labour unions on a countrywide strike for Cost-of-Living Allowance (C.O.L.A.). They got the COLA from the colonial government, and the market women got it from them.
I was about nine years old when the Tafawa Balewa government introduced austerity measures. Everyone cried but soon adapted. Udoji awards followed, and the market women cleaned our pockets inside out. Other salary increases followed with similar effects. We survived the STRUCTURAL ADJUSTMENT PROGRAMME (SAP) of Gen. Ibrahim Babangida. We survived several strikes, afterwards, adapting. Before then, politicians struggling for power led us to the BIAFRA CIVIL WAR (1967-70).
They are back trying to lead us to the cliff and then push us over. The drums of war this time around are too loud and clear to be ignored by intelligent thinkers and observers.
The 2023 general elections would appear to be the most bitterly fought or contested in Nigeria’s election history. In that process, Godwin Emefiele’s CENTRAL BANK OF NIGERIA (CBN) squeezed us dry of cash, literally locking down the country.
He was a Presidential election primary candidate in his ruling party, the APC. SLANDER and insinuations and FAKE NEWS were freely employed as propaganda weapons by one of the parties. But we survived even these ones. The politicians would not allow the electoral court to determine the relevance or otherwise of their grievances against the outcome. They are busy trying to position their memories in the public mind and in the brains of the electoral judges, sometimes dragging them into the affray. Now, they have queued behind the NLC and the TUC for a general strike that would paralyse the country.
What we must all realise or will be forced to appreciate is that it is better to be able to afford only one meal every day in Nigeria, adapting to change, than in living, say, in Sudan, Ukraine, Niger Republic or in the hot spots of the Middle East. I do not see the NLC and the TUC seeing anything good in the TINUBU Administration. The mermaid dancing on the surface of the river is responding to music from the mermaid maidens at the bottom!
FEMI KUSA was at various times Editor; Director of Publication/ Editor-in-Chief of THE GUARDIAN NEWSPAPER; Editorial Director/ Editor-in-Chief of THE COMET NEWSPAPER. Currently, he keeps a Thursday Column on Alternative Medicine in the NATION NEWSPAPER.
Some of his health columns may be found on www.olufemikusa.com and in MIDIUM a digital platform for writers. He is active also on Facebook @ John OLUFEMI KUSA.
