What Obasanjo must not do

By

Ekanem Okon

The President’s recent directive to the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN to put a stop to the sliding naira is one sure step that cannot be accomplished without taking into consideration the economic concept of demand and supply. For a nation that is import-dependent, the directive to CBN ought to go beyond political rhetoric.

To all intents and purposes, the coming to power of President Obasanjo seems to be spelling doom for the socio-political and economic life of the common man. However, the worst hit aspect of the average Nigerian’s life is the purchasing power of his income.

At the naira exchanging for N138 to a dollar, one wonders what form of magic wand the President expects CBN to employ in reducing it to an exchange rate of N85 to a dollar which was the going rate when he mounted the saddle two years ago.

Recently, when the media made news of the president’s directive to CBN, I was amazed not because the president acted by pretending that he has not been part and parcel of the dwindling naira but because the directive showed that the president himself, does not understand the basic economic principles that ought to govern the policies of his government.

The intervention of the president at stabilizing the naira, though, an attempt at arresting an imminent economic catastrophe, which is about enveloping the nation, has, however, left a lot of doubts to which direction the government intends to run its deregulated economic agenda. Must the government wait for things to get out of hand before doing the right things?

It is unfortunate that President Obasanjo’s government issued such a directive when it is glaring that it lacks the will power to effect a desirable change that will impact positively on the naira. In fact, it will take another piece to enumerate instances of where the President has said the things without matching it with action. But one major thing Obasanjo must not do, is to make a hero of the late General Abacha whom we have labelled a looter.