Nigeria – When would the Sleeping giant wake up? – Adesola Ogunnaike | GOVERNMEND
Ex South African President Nelson Mandela once said that Africa will get it right once Nigeria could get it right. This statement was true then but not today. Many African countries have since left Nigeria behind. Nigeria is no longer the giant of Africa she used to be. We have turned our competitive advantages into liabilities. Our Eagles have since stopped flying.
I was at Nairobi, Accra, Lome and Cotonou in the first two weeks of October 2023 on a project exploratory work. The revelations, although they had always been there, were revealing, saddening and very indicting on us Nigerians.
At the Lagos’ Murtala Muhammed International Airport, there were several government agencies at the point of departure, not aiding and controlling movement of passengers but creating avoidable bottlenecks, extorting and begging for money. What are custom officers doing at the departure hall, when the departure hall is not the cargo section of the Airport?
While at the departure hall, I met an Indian National, who just visited Nigeria for an assignment, I engaged him in an interesting and revealing discussion to see his impressions of this once great country, as he is a first-time visitor. He has terrible tales to talk about, how corrupt Nigeria and Nigerians are and why no serious businessman or investor would want to be here doing business. I also met and discussed with a Lebanese, who was also returning home. He said before he came to Nigeria, he had always thought that Lebanon is the most corrupt country on Earth, but seeing what is going on in Nigeria, has made him to conclude that the Lebanese are indeed saints.
I accosted the customs officers at the departure hall of MMA and politely asked to be educated by them, on why they are at the passengers’ departure section. Why not restrict custom activities to only the cargo section of the MMA? They told me that they are stationed there to enforce the 10k USD limit rule. Imagine this, in a digital payment age? This type of embarrassment was not experienced at the Jomo Kenyatta Airport in Nairobi, neither was it experienced at the Kotoka Airport in Accra. Why should this be so in MMA in Nigeria, and we are trying to attract foreign investors? We are not encouraging foreign investors but discouraging them by our actions and deeds. Talk they say is cheap.
Here are we, Nigerians and other countries nationals, flying other countries carriers out of Nigeria with almost a total absence of Nigeria International carriers. We have almost 800million USD trapped foreign Airlines fund waiting to get USD, to repatriate same to their home countries. Ironically, we have Airpeace Airline (A Nigerian carrier) begging to be supported by Nigeria Government to be given slots under BASA to enable her fly directly into Heathrow Airport, London. Airpeace could do Lagos – Heathrow at 600,000 naira return ticket, against the more than 1Million naira being charged by other foreign carriers. Airpeace money will stay with us here in Nigeria and not repatriated anywhere. We have Aero Contractors and Arik Air rotting away under the inefficient AMCON Management. How would 2,000 Naira not equal to 1USD in the forex market?
Money or investment is like water, it finds the easiest way to flow.
I decided to return to Lagos by road, to see what the West Coast corridor looks like in terms of ease of doing business. I have seen how seamless and business friendly travelling between Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania axis is.
There was only one check point between Accra Mall and the Border post between Ghana and Togo republics. There was no check point between the Ghana and Togo border posts. There was none between Togo and Benin republic borders. None also between Benin and Nigeria Seme borders. But from Nigeria Seme border to Badagry, it is indeed a very sad story. It is shameful, disgraceful, how not to be proud as a Nigerian and a complete waste of human resources. It was a complete disaster and glaringly unchecked corruption 24/7 of the day.
I was astonished to personally count 52 check points between Seme Border and Badagry and many more from Badagry till you get to inside Lagos proper, as much as another 10 maybe, I did not count the tail end after Badagry. These are multiple, unnecessary and disgraceful extortion checkpoints of Customs, NDLA, The Police, Immigration, DSS, etc. I was alarmed and ashamed, as I know corruption is pervasive in Nigeria but did not know that the situation has degenerated this bad.
Nigeria has Same unnecessary and extortion checkpoints by both the state and non-state actors, littering all access roads to our various Seaports. I have worked for two years inside the Apapa Port complex, dealing with a lot of these government agencies. The story is a sad one till tomorrow and that of a country at war with itself.
Let us review the state of the roads along the international West Coast route. Togo has the best section, follow by Benin republic, then Ghana and the worst section of that corridor, is Nigeria side. The road is a complete disaster and a reminder that one has arrived in a country called Nigeria in which place, seeing things/Institutions working are exceptions rather than the rules.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Nigeria needs conscious, fast and practical efforts to improve the ease of doing business in Nigeria first for Nigerians and then for foreign investors. We need to make things easier and make us competitive for Nigerians to be able to export through our Land, Sea and Air borders. Nigeria can earn Billions of dollars by the efforts of her citizens by merely removing all the man-made obstacles on her way. We are very intelligent but if we want to be lazy, we can just copy and paste the Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania borders model. We could do far better than most countries. Our government reforms need to give us, not an edge, but a level playing ground with our peers in other lands. The sad story of a Nigerian export of Yam abroad is still fresh in our memory. Why not just copy and paste the Ghana model?
We should remove all the unnecessary and multiple check points, both by the state and non-state actors on roads leading to our Land, Sea and Air borders. These are the first contacts for Foreigners. We should remove corruption on the access roads and demilitarize those routes, to remove the fear of insecurity for a first-time visitor to Nigeria. There should be continuous monitoring to ensure the check points don’t come back gradually.
Roads to all our ports of entries should be fixed. Nigeria should take the lead in fixing her own side and use her big bother authority to encourage others to improve on theirs after we must have fixed ours. The first impression, they say, matters most.
We should encourage local airlines to fly regional and Internationa routes. An airline like Airspace, Aero Contractors, Arik Air etc. could be designated as National carriers and be given all the necessary supports to do both regional and international routes and be provided by the Nigeria government with a level playing ground to compete with both the African and International giants. They don’t need Government money to run these international routes.
Government will need as a matter of urgency to Digitize all government transactions. All human interactions should be removed. With this singular digitization effort, we would have removed 75% of the corruption plaguing the system and make Nigeria attractive to foreign businesses.
All Nigerians must have an identity. The NIN must become the only single identifier for all Nigerians, be it for identification purpose, for passport, driver license, BVN, Election purpose, etc.
CCTV should be installed in all our Ports for security and monitoring of corruption tendencies of government staff purposes. Without control, the best man could become the most terrible.
There were 3 Sleeping giants 100 years ago – China, India and Africa. China and India have woken up, when would Africa wake up? Like Nelson Mandela said, if Nigeria does not get it right, Africa cannot get it right, as 1 in every 5 African is a Nigerian. The time for Nigeria to start waking up is NOW.
Source: Adesola Ogunnaike
