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for an Alternative Economic System By Abdullahi
U. Bello The
state of our economy should give any patriotic citizen of this country
cause for concern. It is not so much as to its deteriorating state but
that those entrusted with managing it are going about their job in the
wrong way. Economics
is a social science, so what is good for this set of people is not
necessarily good for the others. Capitalism is apparently working for
the developed world but certainly not for us. It is working for them
because it is created in the first place with their kind of culture,
philosophy and nature in mind. It working for them does not mean it is
good since as we all know it is at the expense of others. The
appointment of Mrs. Ngozi Okonjo- Iweala as Finance Minister, Mr Soludo
as CBN Governor etc suggests the desire of the World Bank through one of
its principal apologist -President Obasanjo- to impose its own model of
economic policy on us. These are people that have spent most of their
working careers promoting the kind of economic ideas that best suites
the western world. They came to this country as apostles of free market,
strong advocates of capitalism and with rich experiences in the kind of
economy that promote the culture of dog eat dog. Added to all this is
the aura of accomplished professionals that they carry around whenever
they go. They are also protected by a lot of sycophants who want us to
believe that they are making sacrifices for coming home to serve their
fatherland. It would be a sacrifice if with all their wealth of
experience they would come and fashion out a home grown economic
solutions to our own peculiar problems not to dump on us a foreign
recipe in the name of globalization. I have no problem with any one of
them though they are fine professionals and I respect them a lot. However,
how can you explain to an ordinary Nigerian that for the economy to pick
up the government has to right size, another word for retrenchment, that
petrol would have to cost more and that it is normal for the Naira to be
losing its value. At the same time saying that hosting of the
All-African Games and Commonwealth Head of Government Meeting is a good
and necessary investment. In essence what they are saying is that Mrs.
Iweala and co. are only echoing what the western economists have since
described as the economic problem i.e. that there is no enough resources
to fulfill man’s unlimited wants. However, this is not the problem;
the problem is in the idea behind the economic problem itself. How can
you say that there are no enough resources while we are daily being
reminded of the extravagant nature of nature. Just look at the vast
expanse of land around you that cannot all be cultivate, what of the
vegetation covering the face of the earth, consider that out of the so
many million of sperm cell only one fertilizes the egg produced during
reproduction, remember that with all the discussion of lack of adequate
drinking water, water covers three-quarters of the surface of the earth
and what of the air we breath. On the other hand, how can we say that we
must satisfy all our wants regardless of whether they are legitimate or
not, whether our neighbor is incapable of satisfying his basic needs? The
problem is in the concept of economic system adopted, where all effort
is concentrated in the creation of wealth not in its distribution. Where
the concept of value is considered as being relative and not real and so
is treated as a subjective instead of objective measurement. Where price
of commodities are considered as an incentive for production and
therefore the regulator of distribution not minding that there are other
incentive for production like moral, spiritual and social incentives.
So the idea is to find ways to increase our wealth through
privatization, deregulation, monetization, increasing production, having
a favorable balance of payment and increasing of export and so on not in
redistributing the wealth created to the populace in equitable manner.
That is why the government can spend billions to host commonwealth heads
of government for five days but allocate little on agriculture. Spend
over fifty billion at a time to build a stadium, but fail to build a
refinery since 1999 to ease the suffering of the masses. It is also not
surprising that out of the over N19billion set aside by banks to promote
small scale industries only about N7 billion was disbursed. This goes to
show that creating wealth is not a major problem but its equitable
distribution. This government receive more income that any other
government in the history of this country and is arguably the worst
government in terms of the equitable distribution of the income
generated Nigerian
economy can recover and bounce back to being a strong economy if those
entrusted with managing it pause and ponder and change their perception
of what the economic problem is. They should look inward and come up
with a better economic system that is consistent with our values and
culture. The capitalist economic system has failed, at least as far as
the developing nations are concern. An example of a better economic
system is Islamic economics system. Forgive me for using the word
Islamic, our vice president have to come the other day to reiterate and
emphasis that our country is a secular country, so any effort to bring
religion into the affair of governance would be resisted by the
government. The irony of this kind of statement is that the majority of
the people of this country are either Muslims or Christians What
is remarkable about Islamic economic system is that it has provided a
simple model that is applicable in all ages and time. It start by
recognizing that all the resources available on earth belongs to God and
whoever possesses this resources should consider himself as a trustee of
God on earth and therefore he should utilized it according to Gods
wishes. What then are the God wishes, if not to utilize these resources
for the benefit of mankind? It also allows economic
freedom within a limited sphere, freedom to work for a
living, but wealth should be treated as a means and not an end, means to
peace, freedom from hunger and freedom to live in accordance with the
will of the creator. Beyond the satisfaction of basic needs, the
ultimate objective of earning and spending money are moral and spiritual
and finally it stresses the need for us to take care of each other Islamic
perception of “economic problem” therefore differ from the
materialistic perception in that it maintains that God has provided
sufficient means for the fulfillment of all human needs while
materialistic perception maintains that there is no enough resources to
fulfill man’s unlimited wants. These perceptions of secular economists
give rise to the economic problem mentioned above because it encourages
the lack of effort on the one hand and unbridle human wants on the
other. Generally,
the mechanism that Islam proposes for the maintenance of economic
justice in society is that all economic activities should be based upon
moral and spiritual foundations. Man will achieve happiness, bring
economic justice and put an end to human suffering and misery on earth
by abiding to the basic Islamic values. A society that is disciplined by
these principles that the Islam poses as the very content of its creed
as well as its faith and gripped by their ethics will condemn selfish
interest, the basis of present economic life and the source of misery
for all mankind, which will in turn guarantee economic justice in the
society Just
imagine an economy that pride itself with the distribution of available
resources equitably through the removal of interest in the economy, for
interest is one of the courses of the concentration of wealth on few
hands. Because in an interest based economy it is the rich that are
capable of obtaining finance from banks and repaying on time.
Others even if they get the finance would find it difficult to
repay thereby making interest to be accumulating to the point of leading
them to bankruptcy.
One
other way, in Islam, of distributing wealth equitability is Zakat, which
is a poor due taken from the rich and distributed to the deserving poor.
Because of its conditions which are the availability real or assumed
growth, fulfillment of Nisab (minimum amount liable to Zakat),
fulfillment of one’s basic needs and the lapse of a full year it helps
to prevent hoarding and encourages investment activities which in turn
guarantee employment and sustainable development of the economy.
If
each and every individual should pay Zakat on his wealth which roughly
is about 2.5% depending of the nature of the asset, then this country
would be a better place for every body. A World Bank report says that if
2.5% of the world’s grains are put in a store and redistributed among
the poor, there would be no starving people in the world. In Islam the
Zakat rate on grains is 5% if the source of the water is from irrigation
and 10% is it is from rain water. It means that if the Islamic rate is
used hunger would be eliminated twice and four times over depending on
the source of water. Then
there is inheritance, which is a corollary to the principle of dual
ownership which states that
all the resources of the earth belong to God, the creator, who has made
man a trustee for them; then man as a trustee does not have absolute
control over the resources entrusted to him by God. Man should therefore
only utilize it in accordance with the will of the owner – God and
within the limit of economic freedom available to him. It then follows
that when a man dies, the resources he left behind is not his but
God’s and should therefore be distributed according to the stipulation
of the owner. It
is a divine system laid down in the Islamic holy book which clearly
defines how the wealth of the deceased should be shared among those that
are entitled to it. It takes care of every conceivable scenario in the
event of death of a person on how to share the wealth left behind in an
equitable manner. Islam believes that such issues should not be entirely
left to the wishes and caprice of an individual who in some cases will
bequeath all he has to say his dog or cat or to foundation that may not
distribute the wealth in accordance with common good the people.
He may even bequeath the whole wealth to an individual, again
making one person rich while so many others even among his relatives
dying of poverty.
It
is not only Islam that has this kind of social justice, Christianity
also provide so many examples of a society that is build on economic and
social justice. It also discourages interest and unhealthy competition
and recognizes the power of brotherhood and compassion. It teaches it
adherent that “you should love your neighbor as you would love
yourselves”
But
the problem with our educated elites is that they have suspended their
power for rational thinking and have accepted the western system without
question even though they know that it contradicts the very essences of
their being.
Until
the time when we recognizes that what we have is by far better than what
is obtainable now we will continue to wallow in a state of hopelessness,
of economic and social backwardness and finally we will incur the wrath
of the Almighty God who has fashioned out a complete way of life for us
but instead we have taken to the life fashioned out by fellow humans
whose main objective is to satisfy their own selfish motives Abdullahi
U. Bello |