An Opportunity For Citizens

An Opportunity For Citizens’ Unity

Abdullah Musa

War has been declared by IMF and World Bank against Nigerian citizens and other hapless victims elsewhere. Many professionals have made analyses and found that IMF programs never improved peoples’ lives. Why then, you may be tempted to ask, do they require governments to implement them?

The government of Dr Goodluck has Ngozi Iweala posted to it, in order to ‘coordinate’ its activities. Madam Ngozi is a valued asset to these two institutions. We are inclined to believe that Madam Ngozi, being a Nigerian citizen, would not do anything to hurt her country. We are naïve if we think so; because how many Nigerians had held positions of public trust which they abused?

You may draw our attention that she was recently at arms that government was not taking the fight against corruption seriously, even threatening to resign. Quite gallant! After all she has invested much in the World Bank/ IMF structure that she has no need to be corrupt. She is assured of lifetime association if she carries out her assignments with due care and diligence.

Human suffering, particularly of black people is not factored into IMF”s prescriptions. Many might die, or lose a foothold in life, but IMF and World Bank were set up not by Africans but by the West; and logic demands you serve your own master. When Nigerians kick against subsidy removal, they are by implication kicking against the very existence of a party that had made life miserable for them in the past thirteen years.

Was it in May 2011 that Dr Goodluck received fresh mandate? It seems like eternity to me. Nigerians had an opportunity in April to vote in a new government; but in their naivety, they got swayed by factors totally unrelated to their daily existence: ethnocentrism and religious bigotry. With no intention to add insult to injury, I may ask whether there is a separate pump at fuel stations for Christians and another for Muslims.

As a scenario for discussion sake, suppose the government of Dr Goodluck restores pump price to N65 or somewhere a bit tolerable, and then what happens? Then life goes back to ‘normal’: with Boko Haram; Plateau crisis; insecurity; ASUU vs. FG face-off; poor conditions of living; and the continuation of ethnic and religious rivalry. Surely World Bank and IMF have no recipe as to how we can live amicably. Granted NLC is doing a good job, fighting off the hyenas that threaten to eat us up all; but the question that needs to be answered is: how do we get good governance?

This is necessary because in real fact subsidy is a distraction. Its other name is simply ‘the absence of vision’. A party came to power in 1999. It met the subsidy regime which came because Nigeria’s demand for refined petroleum products far exceeded its local capacity. That party did nothing; (its favored sons joining the fuel import paradise) till in its 13^th year in office it decided to, ABRUPTLY, remove the subsidy in one go.

If there was concern; if there was vision, it could have planned a phased removal in order for us to arrive where they wish us to be today. But because our welfare, our life style is not their concern, they apply breaks, totally, on a car going at speed of 180km per hour. IMF’s toxic medicine always results in instant death! We are asked to trust this party. Many did with their lives, they lost it: Bola Ige; Alfred Rewane; Chuba Okadibgo; (some say) even Abubakar Rimi.

We are unfortunate in that we agreed to an inflexible political system. A government is leading us to the gallows, and the journey may last three years; but there is no constitutional mechanism to stop it. Apparently, this government has lost the trust of Nigerians, but it will not fall. When Europe fell into economic crises many of the leading actors had to go. If I remember right, Berlusconi; the Greek Prime Minister; the Irish Prime Minister, all had to go. What of Japan where Prime Ministers came in a stream?

Are there politicians within Nigeria, those who have different developmental path from that of the PDP? Now is their chance to tell Nigerians the way out. Whoever says life is one perpetual status quo is telling us lies. Life is dynamic. Conditions change. Nothing is static. If Dr Goodluck wants history to remember him right, he should agree to put this issue to Nigerians in a referendum, for Nigerians to vote upon. If there is a rig-free poll, Nigerians will reject this subsidy removal. In the happening of that event, he and his Vice should resign, forcing a new presidential election. What of the PDP National Assembly? That is the problem of our inflexible political system. Well?

Who is whispering Tahrir Square into my ears?