By Ilyasu Gadu, Ilgad2009@gmail.com
08035355706 (Texts only)
The Nigerian political and economic ecosystem as presently constituted cannot save itself nor be saved by any contrivance. Principally it is not based on a rule based system firmly sustained and anchored by neutral institutions. It is based on the whims and preferences of individuals grown powerful by predatory instincts and application.
It is a misnomer to call this a capitalist state. In the capitalist states we know, the system is run by rules strictly adhered to and sustained by dos and donts. But here we have an abstract constitution which even those who understand it and have sworn to protect and uphold it neither observe nor obey its provisions.
On the economic side of things our so-called captains of industry are nothing but salesmen of products they do not manufacture or own. Our capitalists such as they are do not produce and regenerate capital through a well integrated productive process. They merely prey on state resources and transfer much of these resources to numbered accounts in far flung tax havens.
So we cannot hope to run a decent economy when capital retention is abysmally low and when capital continually flows out of the country in various ways. For instance if we care to check how much goes out of the country in terms of school fees for foreign education it is enough for us to revamp the entire education system in the country from primary up to tertiary levels and plough into research institutions.
Because there is so little capital to spare to develop the economy and what little left is spirited out in many ways, banks invariably charge usurious rates for borrowing capital which serves as a disincentive for economic development. This economy is well and truly a predators ball and cannot produce and encourage genuine industrialists or capitalists.
So we are now at a junction where both the political and economic ecosystem run by predatory individuals with emphasis on brawn and primeval instincts rather than rational thoughts is feeding on itself and killing itself in the process. In a developed capitalist state, when the state starts to get this way the rules system and the institution intervenes to effect necessary corrections. Here because there are no such rules or even if they exist are neither obeyed or observed it is the predatory individuals that apply their muscle through their raw thugs as in gun men etc and their dapper financial hit men called bankers etc that are deployed to enforce the rules.
This is how the political economy of the Nigerian state has been run and now we have to a cul de sac. I did write that here once that street demonstrations in this country hardly change things fundamentally. I posited that from our empirical experience it is always the struggle between our elites for power and resources that always result in fundamental crises in the country. This happened in the first, second and third republics. And it is going to happen inevitably in the coming months.
Forget Tinubu’s so-called economic reforms. They will not work in a thousand years. They are not guided by any reasonable, rational rules. They are run by speculators and predators of which Tinubu himself is the chief predator.
There can also be no expecting anything positive from the political system. It is peopled by the likes of enforcers like Wike who have no truck on any rules based order.
The political and economic system of Nigeria is now in the hands of the chief predator of the Nigerian system Tinubu and it is his whims and instincts not any set of rational and decent rules that govern the system.
Forget 2027 elections. Forget the so-called economic reforms. Nothing positive will come out of them. The Rivers LG elections have pointed the way things will go in the run up to the 2027 elections.
The Yoyo of the naira and continuing spike in the price of petroleum products tells you that we have an economy run by speculation and speculators. A sort of casino economy.
Welcome to the Tinubu Predators Republic of Nigeria!
Iliyasu Gadu, a former Foreign Service Officer who served at the Nigerian Missions in Germany and the United Kingdom (UK), is a columnist with Daily Trust
