By ONWUASOANYA FCC JONES
Judith, a good friend and colleague of mine, called me this morning to tell me about the need to purchase hard drive in good quantity and keep, because the way prices are going up, the price of purchasing one hard drive might now make up a reasonable sum in the movie budget. Before now, hard drive wasn’t a significant item in drawing your budget for a movie, but, now it is.
Just a month ago when I was planning a production, a 4trb hard drive could be gotten at 200k per one, but as at this morning, my friend bought hers for 450k, and she had to buy six in fear that the price may double again. As at last year, you could get a 4tb Transcend external hard drive for about 100,000 Naira or even less, if you are buying from Lagos. My friend advised me to buy some and keep, because one cannot trust how high it will go in a matter of days, but I told her that it could be risky to buy things in large quantity this period, because the Naira could recover and prices might come crashing down.
Anyone who is close to me knows that beyond what I write for public consumption, I am an incurable optimist in the Nigerian dream. I always believe that Nigeria will get better. Unfortunately, 97% of the time, I have been proven wrong. When dollar was at 600 Naira last year, I told those around me to dispose of their dollars, because they will lose their investments in a few months when the dollar would crash. I count those who didn’t listen to me, lucky and even smarter because if I had a bundle of dollars, I would have sold them off, believing that it wouldn’t get worse than it had.
As at this morning, the dollar is selling at over 1,700 Naira in the black market. The implication is that someone who picks trash in the streets of New York could come back to Nigeria any moment and become a house owner, because the Nigerian big man who might have 100 Million Naira worth of goods in his shop is poorer than a trash picker in the US who is able to save up to 50,000 Dollars.
Tinubu and Cardoso seem as confused and panicky as everyone of us, and their interventions are, instead of arresting the decline, worsening the situation. So, it is actually not logical to maintain any faith in the recovery of the Naira, but someone like me, for no logical reason would continue to feel that Nigeria will heal, soonest. I no longer encourage people to believe with me, because my continuous faith in Nigeria even with realities pointing to the contrary doesn’t make sense to me.
Summoning the 36 State governors to a meeting in Abuja and directing security operatives to monitor those who hoard goods or directing the FCCPC to seal up supermarkets for selling goods at “outrageous” prices are actually the most clueless thing for any government to do. Sending media hirelings to the TV to insult Nigerians by telling us that cost of living in Nigeria is one of the lowest in the world or churning out nonsensical economic theories to supposedly build confidence in his policies, are not encouraging. If we look at the President’s interventions so far, then, we may have to agree with those who predict that the Naira will likely jump to 5000 Naira to a dollar before the end of the year, and that might be Armageddon, because I do not see many people being able to afford to eat, with the spike in prices of goods and services, worsening.
If the Naira must survive and our economy gets any hope of coming out of this mess, then, President Tinubu must think out of the box. He must look beyond the APC for help. Presidents Obasanjo, Yar’Adua and Jonathan were reasonably able to hold our economy together and reduce the tension on Nigerians, because they didn’t insist on rewarding loyalty in making critical appointments, especially, as it relates to our economy. It was the PDP that brought Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Adesina, Ote and even Soludo, who at the time were not members of the PDP. It is obvious that Yemi Cardoso and Wale Edun are overwhelmed by the situation.
Obasanjo brought fresh heads who were not playing in the Nigerian financial sector to revive the Nigerian economy and they largely succeeded. Yar’Adua and Jonathan continued on the same path. None of these Presidents chose patronage of their tribesmen ahead of competence. Tinubu is the only President since 1999 that has appointed the Finance Minister and CBN governor from his own tribe and we are seeing the implication. Both men have been part of the Nigerian system and may not have the integrity to take the required far-reaching actions they need to recover our economy, because they might all have their hands deep in the rot that messed up our economy.
President Bola Tinubu may be the luckiest President in the world at the moment, because even though he came to power with minority votes, he has enjoyed unwavering cooperation of Nigerians more than any other President, but he shouldn’t drag his luck too far. Nigerians need results. Nigerians cannot continue to watch their children go to bed, hungry and their savings running dry on basic needs. Immediate steps are needed to save our Naira, and I do not think the current economic team has the capacity to take these actions.
MAY NIGERIA PREVAIL!
Peoplesmind
