Inadequate transmission oil to pump Nigeria’s economy

In recent months and as the general elections draw near, President Muhammdu Buhari and his team has insisted that economic growth under his presidency “is better than it has been in many decades.”

While some hyperbole is a matter of opinion, my President and claims by his henchmen and woman in the person of Kemi Adeosun that his stewardship of the economy puts his predecessors to shame can be checked by public information that is readily available to all. In fact, the data shown by the National Bureau of Statistics that compared to his predecessors, Buhari’s record so far falls somewhere between unremarkable and substandard. Moreover, other economic data suggest that the current expansion will likely wind down before his term ends, and his boasting will ring hollow once the economy slips from recession to depression because truth be told the situation at the transmitting tower is not good.

It is commonly said that a President deserves some credit or blame for the economy’s performance only after he’s been in office about six months. On those terms, let’s measure Buhari’s words against the record for real GDP growth over the last three quarters (July 2017 through March 2018). And those of the last 20 years and equally note that he is well into the final lap of his administration, the signal strength at the transmission studio is at best poor.

Like all of Mr Buahri’s predecessors, he promised to reform regulation and boost business investment, because such measures can stimulate faster growth. Moreover, if the new investments focus on productivity-boosting equipment, they also can help raise people’s incomes. Through all of last year, Buhari and his advisors insisted that business investment would soar once he cut corruption, but like NaijaBet, the economic team has played a ‘Kalo-Kalo economy. We have transmitted false hopes.

So, Buhari devoted much of his first six months in office to rolling back time and castigating and castrating the economy, and much of the next months on his single major legislative achievement; blaming the past and problems he inherited.  Many economists pointed out that APC had no economic blueprint and if any, its changes didn’t alter reality in any meaningful way.

No economist, much less any politician, has a test or technique to accurately predict the onset of a recession. One important reason is that a recession usually requires a shock that tips a weakening economy into a contraction. And for all the professors, the English accent-speaking minister, apex bank chief, economic team and experts. They all have not figured out, or at best do not agree whether it is inadequate or lack of, or the type transmission oil is the problem besetting our never evolving economy.

 Prince Charles

Dickson Ph.D,

pcdbooks@outlook.com