It is not unknown in history for potentially great nations to fail to realize their full potentialities through their ineptitude, incompetence, lack of vision and the mismanagement of their economies. The favourable combination of resource endowments only establishes the fact that Nigeria’s potentials for growth and development are tremendous. Unless we put in place all the necessary conditions for bringing about an enabling environment – political stability, national unity and cohesion, social discipline and public probity and sound and transparent management of the economy – our country will remain indefinitely one of great potentials but relatively little achievements and Nigeria will remain a rich country with impoverished population.
According to the 2000 World Competitiveness Report of the World Economic Forum and the Harvard University Centre for International Development, Nigeria tops the Optimism Index League Table of 24 African countries while it is in the 20th position, again out of 24 countries, in the African Competitiveness Index. While the former is based on expectations, the latter is based on reality, i.e. actual performance.
These high expectations are no doubt part of the democracy dividends. It is natural to assume that after years of military rule, the restoration of democracy will open the way for dialogue, the building of consensus and the balancing and controlling of interests and power. Afterall, the whole essence of democracy is the most expeditions resolution of public issues and problems – however delicate, complex and difficult – by discussion and compromise based on national-agreed visions and shared ethical and moral values. From these are derived appropriate development paradigms and strategies. This is the only way that compatibility and cooperation can be fostered between and among major actors and stakeholders in the management of the economy. The lack of such compatibility and cooperation is currently Nigeria’s Achilles heel.
It goes without saying that any society or nation that is devoid of visions is like a ship without a ruler. The visions must be indigenous, not imported or borrowed and must be owned by the people. Only visions that are owned by the people because they have been arrived at by consensus after extensive national dialogue and debate can become shared national values.
Without doubt, the more disciplined a society becomes, the more competitive is its economy. And no country can ever hope to exit from poverty and pursue an irreversible path in the democratization of the development process unless its leaders and stakeholders learn to behave better, are accountable and honest and the people generally work very hard and are at peace with one another. Social discipline and competitiveness also require an efficient social sector – particularly education and health sector – efficient and adequate, relative to demand, infrastructural facilities – particularly electricity and transport services – and effective, efficient and dependable financial services sector – banking, insurance, capital and money market.
The poor competitiveness of the Nigerian economy will not be ameliorated by privatization and externally-induced marketization but by improving the low levels of productivity, the deficient infrastructural facilities, the degraded social sector and the ineffective and inefficient financial services sector. Through proper fiscal measures and incentives (including carefully planned and phased subsidies) the full and productive utilization of capacities (particularly industrial and agricultural capacities) must be stimulated. Massive investment in human resources development and in institution-building as well as universal access to basic human needs – food, potable water and energy – are the prerequisites for developing an efficient and industrious society. Finally, the effort to reinvigorate and rejuvenate the Nigerian public service must be accelerated. The nation must learn anew that a highly qualified, competent and efficient public service is an imperative for the sound management of any modern economy.
The liberalization of an economy without preceding fundamental changes in existing socio-economic relations is unlikely to lead to a workable market system. Unbridled marketisation results in ghastly failures: failures to provide full employment, failures to meet the basic needs of the population, failures to protect the environment, and failures to avoid appalling waste. It is seldom true that the market ensures that what is produced is what the people want and that resources are optimally utilized always.
To attract and keep some of the best talents in their public services, the Asian governments have ensured that recruitment and promotion are highly competitive and are based on merit. They have invested highly in public education, training and reorientation. In this particular area, the present federal government, since its assumption of power in May, 1999, has been exemplary in both its initiative and performance and has accordingly achieved substantial progress. But in other areas, there are still a lot of initiatives waiting to be taken.
For example, there is need to link pay with productivity and to appreciate that the price of paying low salaries is to buy inefficiency and encourage corruption. There is also the need to look closely into the structure and functioning of the public service with a view to modernizing and rationalizing the various ministries and departments in order to remove duplication and enhance efficiency and service delivery.
Finally, the government must widen the scope of independent indigenous policy making and economic management by reducing its dependence on foreign expertise, using its own officials and nationals, and developing in them competences in which they may presently be lacking. Professionalism in the management of the economy must be restituted. There are simply too many amateur experts and advisers fiddling the complex, complicated and delicate socio-economic problems and thereby exacerbating the task of managing the economy effectively and efficiently. Economic policies are not culture neutral and foreigners, quite understandably, tend to look at the problems of other societies with their own societal and organizational lenses.
While the people of Nigeria particularly our political leadership, must inevitably think globally, prudence and enlightened self-interest demand that we should act locally. It is only by doing so that we can prepare the national economy to successfully face the challenge of globalization. The most Herculean task which we have in the connection is how to remodel our political, economic and social institutions from being the mimicry of foreign ones to ones that are in tune with our indigenous organizations while they still remain within the boundaries of the optimization path. It is only then that we can assure compatibility between our social economy and our market economy. It is only then that our nascent democracy can be nursed and nourished to grow and become sustainable.
For Nigerian to become a significant player in the global economy by the time of its golden jubilee in 2010, four conditions must be satisfied. First and foremost, it must cease to be at war against itself. Conflicts and crises must be reduced to the barest minimum and shivering and hovering on the brink must become a thing of the past. In short, the country must become a rainbow nation, at peace with itself.
What most African countries have lacked since independence are leaders who are true unifiers, who have the well-developed capacity to float magisterially above disaffection, partisanship and squabbles. Leaders who heal wounds rather than impose injuries, who unify rather than alienate and who mobilize and motivate their people and crave and work relentlessly for their people’s rather than for foreign, praise.
The second condition is ensuring the efficiency of public service particularly public utilities infrastructure: banking service and social services. Third is social discipline which assures the efficiency of the society as a whole. Fourth is putting in place a participatory system of governance whereby the people and their grassroots and community-based organizations participate fully in policy formulation, execution, monitoring and evaluation.
These four conditions can only be satisfied when a country adopts a holistic sustainable human development paradigm. This is development that is pro-people, pro-nature, pro-jobs and pro-women, a development that not only generates economic growth but also transforms the society by distributing the benefits equitably. It empowers the people rather than marginalizes them. It regenerates rather than destroys the environment. There can be no light in the nation’s dark political and economic tunnel as long as the primacy of the human imperative is neglected.
Globalisation, privatization, marketisation and liberalization are by and large catch words that we should not be overly concerned with at this point in time. In any case, Nigeria has always been totally and unevenly integrated into the global economy. Our challenge is to redress the imbalance, the inequity. Therefore, we must focus on the primacy of the human condition. Whereas economic growth, even high growth rate, has often exacerbated human development, no country that has consistently and consciously followed the path of human-centred holistic development paradigm has failed to achieve both high growth rates and equity. The generation of full employment and the ensuring of job security are central objectives of the human development strategy. Economic reform programmes which sacrifice job creation in favour of achieving macro-economic balances have not been sustainable because they are anti-people and are socially destabilizing as the democratic process.
We cannot afford to continue with the “business-as-usual” approach based on foreign crafted development paradigms. If we do, Nigerians will remain among the poorest people in the world.
