For the first time, in many a year, Nigeria may have a budget ready for implementation from the beginning of the fiscal year, following the Senate’s early approval of the 2020 Budget. This is welcome progress. Unfortunately, this annual ritual has made very little impact on the lives of Nigerians. We go through this farcical exercise every year, repeating the same mistakes and expecting a different outcome.
Addressing Nigeria’s funding challenges would require making difficult policy choices that may not be popular, but nonetheless in the best interest of the country. Fuel subsidy, or ‘cost under-recovery’, as it is now referred, remains the biggest albatross to Nigeria’s economic development, depriving Nigeria of much-needed funds for job creation and infrastructural development.
There is something fundamentally wrong in a budget that allocates N125bn to the National Assembly and N46bn capital to health for a population of 200 million. If you have any serious medical condition like cancer in Nigeria today the prognosis for over 90 per cent of the population who cannot travel abroad for treatment is dire.
As a country Nigeria could be doing much better. The Nigerian entrepreneurial spirit is thriving wherever Nigerians are based, whether in the USA, the UK, South Africa and nearer home in Ghana. Nigerian businesses are creating jobs and making a huge impact on the GDPs of their host countries. The problem in Nigeria is simply government and its agencies.
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