Nigeria’s Sustainability Does Require Some Work
The term sustainability tends to throw people off nowadays seeing as it has assumed an exclusively academic toga and therefore requiring diligent research to unearth its meaning and practice.
To be sure, there is a solid academic aspect to the term, which was what enabled its popularity in the public imagination. And this is usually with regards to man’s interaction with the environment and his ability to replenish as quickly as he takes. Is man lopping off more than he needs, chopping down massive acreages of forests in the Amazon, in the Congo Basin, and distorting the coral reefs of the world’s oceans? Is there an imbalance in the ecosystem such that the components that mediated the planet’s wholeness are being destroyed at such an alarming rate that it’s now far more difficult for them to reproduce themselves?
Is there a crazy level of CO2 emissions leading to an ever widening hole in the ozone layer that then makes the sun more poison, fierier than its traditional role as our planet’s major source of warmth and life? And what’s with the plastics which have found their way into the ocean in increasing quantities as micro granules are ingested by fish and other life forms in the oceans? The fear is that plastics, being indigestible are likely to alter the genetic map of the lives there, and man being the apex predator, those same plastics undetectable to the ordinary eyes could find their way into our body system and maybe alter a thing or two, leaving today’s indifferent man maybe an altogether different being.
The burgeoning field of sustainability is teeming with folks involved in tackling, crusading against and trying to manage the situation so our world as we know it stays replenished rather than depleted. The irony is that the sustainability quest was brought about in the first place by man’s pursuit of better living conditions. It’s ironic that man’s quest for a living upgrade is ending up degrading the very environment that his children will inhabit someday.
Don’t we all recall that classic and oft quoted definition/ description of sustainability? “Sustainability focuses on meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. So to the point! That’s why the UN Sustainability Goals are about today but more importantly about tomorrow, because our careful husbanding of today’s resources is what guarantees any future worth looking forward to.
And that is why it is needful that we defrock the word of its assumed academic toga every once in a while so that we can see its applicability in our everyday lives. The 17 UN SDG Goals help to bring that home. And so, how
does it all apply to Nigeria?
For Nigerians who grew up in the 60s, 70s and 80s thinking that in a few years they would have the world at their feet, it’s been a case of degradation, frustration and yet more degradation. Although, to be fair, the graph did experience some bump upwards before another tragic slide.
Nigeria experienced a steep economic decline in the 1980s, beginning under Alhaji Shehu Shagari, who, seeing no way out, chased the Ghanaians out believing their presence here was responsible for shortening the Nigerian’s ration. Major General Muhamadu Buhari’s intervention via a coup in 1983 did little to right the boat. It was careening further downhill when General Ibrahim Babangida stepped in and ubiquitously deployed his supposed magic wand which worked no wonder in all of eight years. His Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) weaponised poverty via the devaluation of the Naira and subsequent hyperinflation. It then fell to Sani Abacha (Let’s not talk about the Interim Govt: a clear waste of everybody’s time); who held forte and successfully made of Nigeria a pariah country. We became a ‘landlocked state’ as sanctions hit us from everywhere, but Abacha would not budge. He actually would have become a civilian president as he empowered Youths Earnestly Ask for Abacha (YEAA) for the 2Miliion Man March that was supposed to validate the ‘public yearning’ for his transmutation.
This piece rather than being a history lesson is just a quick scan of what we’ve been through as a nation. So, yes, we’ll miss out on details. Abacha’s untimely but ‘welcome’ demise, as corroborated by the wild celebrations that spontaneously broke out on the streets all over Nigeria at the news of his death, saw near asphyxiated Nigerians dancing the freedom dance in the streets.
Olusegun Obasanjo, give him credit, did some wonderful things with the Nigerian economy especially in his second term. Prior to his presidency, Nigerians were
nothing but a poor and impoverished people, the middle class having been totally decimated. He committed to rebuilding the middle class via his economic reforms which, in his second term, had liquidation of Nigeria’s external debts as a major goal. This was ticked off with the stellar economic management team that had Atiku Abubakar, Ngozi Okonjo-iweala, Charles Soludo, Oby Ezekwesili, Nasir El-rufai, and others working to achieve it.
And for whatever it was worth, the Oputa Panel, headed by the late Justice Chukwudifu Oputa, which was about checking for human rights violations from 1966 – 1999, gave citizens ample opportunity to air their grievances and for old foes to make up in an atmosphere devoid of acrimony. Ultimately, the Panel received no due government imprimatur. But it was good for letting out some of the bad air that had built up over the years. The EFFC under Nuhu Ribadu was not perfect but it was clear that ill-gotten wealth would be tracked and violators prosecuted. Federal character was important in high office allocations. Every part of the country needed to feel a sense of belonging. OBJ had his many issues, his not so democratic soldierly inflexibility abandoning its camouflage every now and then. The high profile murders and assassination, including that of a sitting Attorney-general and Minister for Justice, still unsolved, also happened under his watch. But in the big department of nation building, or is it cobbling, for sustainability, his time in office would be a major reference for as long as Nigeria survives.
Obasanjo’s successors, Umaru Musa Yar’adua and Goodluck Jonathan did their bit, and despite the prevalent negative narrative, the economy was generally on course, growing year on year until 2014. According to the World Bank, the Nigerian economy grew, between 2000 and 2014, at an average rate of 7%. And it was lauded in all the economic circles around the world. Nigeria rode out the economic recession of 2008 largely on account of its savings from its
Excess Crude Account (ECA) created by the OBJ administration. When the Sovereign Wealth Fund was created under Jonathan, the 36 state governors were up in arms declaring it as illegal. For them, we had to chop everything that accrued to the national till. The middle class was in full bloom, Nigerians were returning from the West to resettle in the country seeing as the country’s trajectory looked all positive.
How does this historical flight figure in our discussion on sustainability? Because, essentially, nations are about sustainability. And it’s the effort of government and the citizenry that helps bring this about. The right policies go a long way. Implementation of those policies helps everyone breathe easier and reduces tension. No country can survive that is not secure; where banditry, armed robbery, kidnapping, etc., become the norm, and where citizen engagement is disregarded despite howls regarding infrastructure decay on the roads, in our schools, hospitals, water supply, etc.
The business of keeping Nigeria together and ensuring its competitiveness should be a serious one, particularly when cries of marginalization are emanating from everywhere. The Federal Government needs to work towards bringing everyone under a big tent that has them covered from the stress faced daily in the country and outside the country. Citizens should be proud of the green passport but that’s not something that will happen for as long as we are a country that does not look out for its people.
Nigerians like to talk. And so we should be allowed the freedoms as guaranteed in the constitution, of speech, association, etc. These are fundamental rights that should not be denied citizens. A sustainable Nigeria is one that cannot keep borrowing at the rate we are borrowing, and not now with sovereign assets clearly within the crosshairs of Chinese borrowers.
More than anything else, the Nigerian Federation cannot survive with the deepening poverty which is everywhere. The label of poverty capital of the world is a despicable one. Unfortunately, we seem to be digging deeper into mire. The double whammy of tariff increase for power and PMS pricing have the potential for driving more and more people towards the edge and to a point where they would sabotage the country that has failed to guarantee any meaningful life.
Government cannot be about mowing down viewpoints from the other side. We are all invested in this country that we like to prefix ‘beloved’ and should be heard and our position respected. Without a strong sense of sustainability the people in government today will come out to the woes of the general citizenry tomorrow. A sustainable Nigeria must be about responsible development, one that increasingly leaves no one behind.