Post COVID-19: The Next Big Thing

was the base for Leventis Motors and its super malls, Kingsway stores,

VONO Products, Bata Shoes with its brand, COTINA shoes, LENNARDS

shoes, (all producing shoes from tanned leather here in Nigeria) and

Michelin Tyres in Port Harcourt, etc.

In that era, we were riding in locally assembled cars, truck, and buses. With

Peugeot in Kaduna, Volkswagen in Lagos, ANAMCO in Enugu, NISSAN

and TOYOTA Motors in Lagos and LEYLAND in Ibadan. We had STEYR in

Bauchi producing agricultural tractors and its components. VONO products

then in Lagos were producing the seats. We can remember the Odutolas of

from rubber plantation in River State, and today, the rubber has

disappeared. Neither has any administration, past or present, made efforts

to revive it.

We had SANYO in Ibadan and KENWOOD in Lagos and by their

establishment, we were able to listen and watch television simply because

the assembly plants were sited here. We had THERMOCOOL producing

fridges, freezers and air-conditioner for our comfort.

The textile industry which used to employ millions of Nigerians, like the

United Nigerian Textiles Limited (UNTL), based in Kaduna and Chellrams

Stores in Lagos, were producing fabrics from cotton grown here in Nigeria,

How about some government-initiated enterprises like the Nigeria Airways,

Nigeria Railways Corporation and Nigeria National Shipping Lines? These

enterprises were pride of the nation, Nigeria, and Africa,

Nigeria because of its enormous economic power and resources, naturally

became the economic giant of Africa.

However, the petrol-dollar economy fuelled with the discovery of oil moved

the continent, and particularly Nigeria, from prosperity to poverty. This oil is

today an albatross to our economic growth and sustenance as we are at

the mercies of the giant players and world powers who manipulate prices

as it suits them.

Nigeria began its descent to this sorry state, particularly with the incursion

of the military into power in our polity. In that era was a head of state who

poverty. A clueless former military president, once lamented after dribbling

himself and Nigerians to a cul-de-sac, that Nigeria’s economy had defied all

economic theories. Visionless leadership.

The rape on the nation’s resources continued with the return of the country

to democratic rule, though short-lived, 1979 – 83, the military made its

return and the rest as they say is history.

Due to the absence of consistent development of its natural resources, lack

of commensurate infrastructure to sustain the industry and failure to

leverage the value chain in order to better the welfare of its people,

agriculture took the backstage for the dollar spinning oil.

journey started decades back. But we were not discerning enough or

pretended not to know that the path we had charted, neglecting the first

bride, agriculture, was a journey to economic leprosy, and if care is not

taken, death. The nation’s situation is made worse by its internal security

challenges, especially the incessant herders/farmers crisis that has

affected the food producing zones in the country, thus spiking food inflation

as farmers are no longer able to go to their farms.

In 2016, Nigeria slipped into economic recession, and it was hoped that

lessons learnt from the crisis would have sufficed to make us rethink how

the government and we, Nigerians, conduct our affairs.

We were practically importing everything including toothpicks until the CBN

Governor in 2016, in the midst of economic crisis, announced the

suspension of 41 items from the forex official window. He later added two

other products. Godwin Emefiele had identified those items as the ‘big

elephant’ draining the nation’s reserves. The import bills were so huge that

it created exchange rate crisis for the Naira. At a time, the local currency

exchanged for N525/$1, before measures were taken by the Bank to arrest

the drift.

However, COVID-19 with its destructive escapade, has a lesson for us all

to learn from, backward integration. I wonder if the government had not

diversification, but also to look inwards, join hands together with those

charged with the responsibilities of running the government and the

economy. This is the Next Big Thing.

The next big thing if we are serious as a nation, is for all of us to do all we

can to avoid another recession. The federal government and the CBN

especially must work together and maintain a sustained collaboration to

facilitate inclusive growth and development across priority sectors,

particularly, those that are employment elastic and have high economic

impact. This is highly imperative if Nigeria must avert another economic

crisis.

The issue of power, electricity supply is critical as Nigerians have not been

impressed with the government despite huge finances that had been

programmes and initiatives to tackle the high rising unemployment rate

should be put in place. Unemployment largely has been attributed to be the

cause of the pervasive insecurity challenge in the country. It is a timed-

bomb waiting to explode.

The Central Bank of Nigeria has demonstrated its willingness and

readiness with its various interventions, particularly at the outbreak of the

pandemic, by providing cheap loans to households and businesses

affected by the virus. It has also demonstrated its readiness to improve

access to credit for not only smallholder farmers and MSMEs, but to also

enhance consumer credit and mortgage facilities.

farmers.

However, the fiscal authority, the federal government, and its agencies

must brace up with matching initiatives such as providing sustainable

infrastructure that can generate growth and development. This is the

yearning of Nigerians.

Ademola Bakare, a media consultant writes from Abuja.