A rare good news for
Nigerians: two prominent Nigerians made the list of the “100 Top Global
Thinkers of 2012” according to Foreign Policy magazine.
They are Prof. Chinua Achebe, for “forcing Africa
to confront its demons” and Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, for “showing Africa how to
break the resource curse.” While the inclusion of Chinua Achebe is welcome
without hesitation, the inclusion of Dr. Okonjo-Iweala vis-a-vis the record
monumental corruption in the Nigerian oil and gas sector may raise some
eyebrows.
While I agree with Dr. Okonjo-Iweala on the concept
of oil subsidy removal, I disagree with her on the roadmap. While Dr.
Okonjo-Iweala believes that our resource curse will be reversed by simply
removing subsidy, I believe that corruption and corrupt practices in Nigerian
oil industry remains the main problem and as such, should be the starting
point.
Of what use is oil subsidy removal for a government
that cannot account to its crude oil production(with a fifth of our crude oil
stolen), running an inefficient and oversized NNPC with dilapidated refineries?
Of what use is oil subsidy removal in a country that spends over 70% of its
budget on recurrent-expenditure, servicing bogus and extravagant lifestyle of
the executive and legislative arms of government? Has Dr. Okonjo-Iweala learnt
anything from the present subsidy scam with President Jonathan's unwillingness
to prosecute the likes of Otedola and co that financed his campaign?
I sincerely hope by now that Dr. Okonjo-Iweala has
realized that she is being used by the GEJ administration as a camouflage while
confusion and corruption reigns. To truly succeed in helping Nigeria overcome
the oil curse and corruption, Dr. Okonjo-Iweala must force President Goodluck
Jonathan to confront the demons in his (himself) administration. To help her, I
came up with ten provocative demands she should confront Jonathan with.
1. Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should
bluntly tell Dr. Jonathan that he is not just incompetent but that he is
impotent in fighting corruption in Nigeria. She should thus advise him to
honorably resign. We know President Jonathan will not resign so, she has to
demand a pragmatic approach to tackling corruption with this second demand;
2. Paraphrasing Benjamin
Netanyahu, Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should bluntly tell Dr. Jonathan that the fight
against corruption in Nigeria should not be fought with Diezani Alison-Madueke
on his laps but with a rocket-propelled grenade between his teeth. She
should tell President Jonathan to stop his eyes from beholding and his concupiscence
from coveting his concupiscible and corrupt mistress at NNPC.
3. Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should
bluntly tell Dr. Jonathan that Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke must be removed as
the Petroleum Minister as a condition for her continued involvement with the establishment
of the sovereign wealth fund to manage our oil riches
4. Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should then
admit to Dr. Jonathan that she was wrong with her approach to tackling the
endemic corruption in the oil sector through subsidy removal. She should then
tell him that all our refineries must be sold out rightly, the management and
board of NNPC sacked and restructured as a pre-condition to future subsidy
removal
5. Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should
bluntly tell Dr. Jonathan that EFCC as currently constituted and empowered is
not effective because of the obstructive interference from him, through his
Attorney General Adoke. She should therefore go ahead and ask him to sack Adoke
and appoint someone that will not only assist EFCC in fighting corruption in
Nigeria but one that will ensure that corrupt judges are not rewarded by
appointment to Supreme Court and federal high courts.
6. In the words of Chinua Achebe,
Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should bluntly tell Dr. Jonathan that he has surrounded
himself with corrupt “Politicians with plenty of money and very low IQ.”She
should remind Mr. President that money without brains is dangerous. She should
ask him what he is doing with second-rate friends including Dr. Doyin Okupe and
Tony Anenih. She should remind him that since the start of the oil boom in the
70s, we’ve had all the money, but unfortunately not the brains to take the
country in the right direction.
7. With her mouth closed, Dr.
Okonjo-Iweala should shout to Dr. Jonathan's hearing that the few smart people
he appointed to work with him are intellectually lazy (including herself and
Dr. Abati). With her gaze firmly resting on Mr. President’s nostrils, she
should tell him that there is little excuse for obviously well paid and well
educated professionals to be deceiving themselves and those around them that
Nigeria is being moved in the right direction by this administration.
8. Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should
bluntly tell Dr. Jonathan that he is a diet of underdone roasted yam and owner
of the trumpet of misery and deceit
9. Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should
bluntly tell Dr. Jonathan that he is an epitome of a school master that cannot
read nor write. Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should tell Mr. President that she sometimes
wondered how he managed to engage his students in critical problem solving in
designing research as a professor. She should then pick a piece of paper, write
this down and hand it to Mr. President: “I’m afraid Mr. President, but
you are a model of foolish consistency.”
10. Finally, Okonjo-Iweala should
advise Dr. Jonathan not to run for office in 2015 if he has ever cared for
Nigeria in his adult life. She should quietly tell him that he is dumb and does
not possess the leadership qualities needed to take Nigeria to where we should
be heading to. She can simply convince him by reminding him that his
administration has been not just one of poor moral level of leadership and
competence, but also one with blurred vision. Vision blurred by
corruption, intellectual dullness and moral depravity.
Then Dr. Okonjo-Iweala should turn in her
resignation, tell Jonathan to call her when demands 2 – 10 are met, quietly go
home and think. Between oil subsidy removal and addressing the oil theft and
government-assisted corruption in the oil sector, she should take time and think
about what should come first. Critical thinking, that’s what “Global Thinkers”
do.
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