White elephant projects

Also published in Daily Trust

The mere sight of many resource-consuming white elephant projects in towns and cities across Nigeria provokes huge frustration, in view of the sheer amounts of public funds effectively wasted therein, as the projects don’t add any value to the economy, and aren’t likely to do so in the foreseeable future, either. Unfortunately, this trend persists anyway despite the acute scarcity of funds experienced at all levels of government in the country.

While many of such projects are completed, albeit still unutilized or grossly underutilized, many others initiated several years ago are still purportedly under construction, or rather, have been simply abandoned halfway and at the mercy of the succeeding holders of the public offices concerned, who may not necessarily bother to complete them, after all, since they equally have their own plans for similar white elephant projects. 

Capitalising on forex crisis

Also published in Daily Trust

As the economic repercussions of the discontinuation of the regular supply of foreign exchange to bureau de change (BDC) operators by the Central of Bank of Nigeria (CBN) continue to unfold, there are tremendous opportunities for local manufacturers and entrepreneurs, in particular, who can capitalize on the situation to achieve phenomenal growth.

After all, since they lost ground following the gradual collapse of the country’s local industries, Nigeria’s economy lost a great deal of its economic potential. This is though, some local manufacturers, especially in southern Nigeria, have, nevertheless, managed to not only survive, but, in fact, thrive anyway, as many successful entrepreneurs have emerged and grown into successful business owners. However, unfortunately, in northern Nigeria, which was already lagging behind economically, ever since the eventual collapse of the region’s vibrant and promising industries, the situation has been going from bad to worse.

As stealing gets difficult…..

Also published in Daily Trust

The recent revelation by President Muhammadu Buhari that more than two trillion naira were saved in just three months, thanks to his administration’s commitment to the Treasury Single Account (TSA), is greatly encouraging, considering the sheer amount of the funds saved, which is equal to about one-third of Nigeria’s total budget, and which would have otherwise ended up in the personal bank accounts of some corrupt civil servants and politicians.

Likewise, the recent detection of more than two hundred thousand ghost workers on the federal government payroll, which, by implication, means saving billions of naira that some unscrupulous civil servants have been systematically stealing over the years as purported salaries, allowances and other entitlements of such ghost workers, proves the efficiency of the Bank Verification Number (BVN) technology, which greatly facilitates President Buhari’s anti-corruption drive.