Soludo, El-Rufai, Sanusi, Others Chart Path for Nigeria’s Transformation, Sustainable Devt

•Set priorities for incoming administration 

•Kaduna governor blames lack of political will for failure to restructure Nigeria

Ndubuisi Francis in Abuja

Governors of Anambra and Kaduna States Prof. Chukwuma Soludo and Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, a former Emir of Kano, Alhaji Muhammadu Sanusi II, as well as the World Bank Country Director for Nigeria, Dr. Shubham Chaudhuri, among others, have expressed concern over Nigeria’s uninspiring growth and transformation trajectory, calling for urgent institutional reforms complimented by the desired political will to make a head-start.

Their perspectives on the need for an urgent paradigm shift in the country’s transformation and development journey, were canvassed in Abuja, yesterday, at a policy conversation and book presentation organised by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in collaboration with Agora Policy.

Soludo, who jump-started the panel discussion on, “How Nigeria Can Build a Post-oil Economic Future,” noted that several diagnosis on the challenges of Nigeria’s rapid development had remained similar, ranging from one think-tank, institution, analysts, experts or even studies.

Lamenting that the country had witnessed episodic moments of surge and decline, the former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) whose intervention was virtual, noted that the country had been characterised by occasional transformational and transactional leaderships.

According to him, Nigeria’s development travails did not stem from the lack of awareness of the problem, but the lack of the needed political will to implement impactful, enduring transformational and development policies.

He observed that no meaningful development could be recorded without an effective restructuring of the country.

Soludo noted that despite making the concept of restructuring a cardinal thrust of its manifesto in 2015, the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) failed to ensure implementation.

He recalled that during the administration of President Olusegun Obasanjo, the country went through an impressive and sustainable economic growth for many years, due to the transformation policies and political will of the administration.

According to him, what was required was for a retrospective look at what the government did well at that time to achieve a seven per cent annual growth rate for many years.

The governor canvassed a deliberate policy for expert-led strategy, insisting that the restructuring of the economy was the least needed to move away from transactional politics which he stressed was the bane of development in the country.

He said: “We cannot have a competitive economy without a competitive system. We need a productive rather than a consumption leadership.”

In his intervention, El-Rufai stated that its takes a political leadership that has the courage and political will to take hard decisions to achieve transformation.

Taking a retrospective excursion to the Obasanjo years, el-Rufai noted that “you don’t need more than ten ministers to do a solid work.”

He stated that when Obasanjo wanted to go down in history as one who left something behind, he assembled technocrats and gave them the required political backing, “which also led to the historic debt relief.”

Furthermore, El-Rufai observed that all the country needed was competent leadership which was desirous of communicating its programmes and policies to Nigerians whom he described as very supportive.

The governor stated that, “as political leaders, we must face our problems and be pragmatic.”

Responding to Soludo’s remark that the APC-led administration failed to implement its restructuring agenda, El-Rufai said as the chairman of the committee that recommended the policy, they opted for the 1954 constitutional system.

According to him, that was meant to devolve more powers and responsibilities to the states and make the centre less attractive, regretting that lack of political will torpedoed the implementation of restructuring.

“It was lack of political will that made the APC restructuring agenda not to be implemented,” he said.

He also advocated for a study of what happened in the years of the Obasanjo administration that achieved a seven per cent annual economic growth rate.

The Kaduna State Governor warned that Nigeria must address the petroleum subsidy behemoth ‘tomorrow’, or fall into the hands of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Calling for elite consensus to urgently resolve the matter, he warned that Nigeria must not slide the way of Sri Lanka.

On the problem of poor revenue generation, he cautioned against increasing taxes, but increasing the number of those in the tax net.

To move the country forward, El-Rufai said there should be a deliberate move to reduce religious suspicion, engage the best and competent people in public service.

He emphasised that Nigeria was not an oil-rich country, and advised that, “we must face reality, particularly now that we are in transition.”

In his remarks, Emir Sanusi said he did not believe in the position of some people that those who deserved to be blamed should be spared.

“If we want to make progress in the country, we have to look at what’s good and bad, blame where there’s need,” adding that some administrations in the country have not performed well.

Sanusi urged Nigerians to start emphasising their expectations from the next administration.

According to him, transactional politics should be de-emphasised henceforth while competence which guarantees round pegs in round holes should hold sway.

Also speaking, a former Group Managing Director of Access Bank Plc, and Chairman of Coronation Capital, Mr. Aigboje Aig-Imouhuede, called on the incoming administration to embrace fiscal consolidation, avoid subsidising what cannot be afforded, embark on debt restructuring which would be a painful pill and embark on massive private sector investment.

On his own part, Chaudhuri, called for transformational leadership in Nigeria which had placed Indonesia, India and other peers on the path of sustainable growth.

Earlier in his opening remarks, the founder of Agora Policy, Mr. Waziri Adio, commended what he described as the remarkable book  by Dr. Zainab Usman, the pioneer director of the Carnegie Africa Programme.

He noted that Nigeria’s economic performance had been uneven and below par, adding that so much had been written about this and the reasons for the undesirable outcome.

“The Nigerian condition has been well documented and well theorised. But Nigeria’s uneven and sub-par economic performance is not just about theoretical constructs, or just a mere academic exercise or just a set of raw or stylised data.

“It is about lives lived and not lived. It has flesh and blood implications for all of us, especially for most of our citizens. And it has political, social and security dimensions that reverberate within and beyond our borders.

“The second point is that development, the sustainable variant, is not a naturally-occurring phenomenon. It is created. It is not just about plans dutifully and periodically drawn up, but more about carefully considered choices and consistently applied actions by the political and the policy elites. Development is deliberate.

“The third point is that a different development path is not just desirable for Nigeria, it is necessary. It is urgent. It is existential. And there can’t be a better time than now to start that deliberate journey of not only thinking differently, but acting differently, and most importantly—optimally and consistently.

“I personally look forward to an engaging and solution-centred deliberation today,” Adio said.

Presenting the book, “Diversification in Nigeria: The Politics of Building a Post-Oil Economy,” which was voted as one of the Best Books of 2022 on economics by the Financial Times, Dr. Zainab Usman, lamented the nation’s uninspiring development trajectory despite its vast potential.

Nigeria, she noted, is neither a developmental nor a failed state.