“It is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong.” Jeremy Bentham, 1748-1832, in A fragment on Government.
Let me declare upfront that I am in total support of the two fundamental policies of Tinubu’s administration.
Fuel subsidy had to do; and exchange rate needs to be harmonised. My disagreement was with the implementation of the two policies.
It is also a fact that Emilokan inherited a totally ruined economy; with damages starting from Obasanjo’s regime.
The first civilian administration, after the military, from 1999 to 2007, left with nothing less than N8 trillion of national funds mismanaged.
The details are in my book, PDP: Corruption Incorporated; portions of which had been cited several times without any one in the government and party disputing them.
Silence always means consent. In actual fact, several items of interest, valued at almost N2 trillion, were left out of the book because the proof was not conclusive. On this page, facts are sacred.
That said; it is vital to face our current food crisis – which, after the Maiduguri flood, is racing towards a major catastrophe.
Still ahead of us is the release of water from the Lagdo Dam in Cameroon; which is inevitable and guaranteed to bring massive destruction to the Northeast first, Benue/Taraba second, Kogi third and the Niger Delta last.
To state that we are in deep trouble is to understate the extent of the problems confronting us. Solutions constitute our most urgent need; allied with credible implementation plans, a good management team and the national will to save our people.
Duty-Free Policy Revisited
“In a sick country, every step to health is an insult to those who live on the sickness.” Bernard Malamud, 1914-1986 in THE FIXER.
When the Federal Government announced the policy of duty free importation of selected food items, there was no doubt in my mind that those benefiting immensely from pervasive food scarcity would oppose it.
They did. I fully supported it. To be quite candid, there was/is no alternative to massive food imports this year.
The floods nationwide, the latest in Maiduguri, and more after Lagdo, point to the worst nightmare for our country. In fact, the slow implementation of that policy mighthavereducedNigeria’schancesof securingfood imports as flooding is now becoming global this year.
Farms in some of the nations which would have supplied us with food are also under water. Global food harvests are threatened everywhere. Ours is already devastated.
Those feeding on the nation’s sickness have approached the policy sabotage two ways. First, they have delayed implementation.
The programme, intended to end in November this year has not even got started.
Today, not a single grain of paddy rice has been imported for the most obvious reason – no licence to import. It might not have occurred to the President, Governors and their advisers that time is also an economic resource – as much as capital, labour and ideas.
With more than two months gone out of the six months allowed for duty-free imports, we have inadvertently created a huge time gap for the relief those imports would provide.
Meanwhile, flood catastrophe everywhere in the world is limiting the sources of supplies of the foodstuff we will need to avert massive lost of lives on account of famine.
To state that we must hurry up in taking remedial measures is to pronounce the obvious. In fact, whatever we are about to now do must have been accomplished weeks ago.
Further delay is dangerous. That being the case, there is a need to re-visit the guidelines stipulating thoseentitieswhichcanapplyforimportlicenceunder the programme.
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The case for Lagos State is so compelling that nobody who actually has the nation’s interest at heart can fault it. I am aware that there are those who would assume that I am canvassing for inclusion of Lagos State because I am from the state.
My only plea is for those people to take the trouble to finish reading this advocacy and then decide if it is a narrow-minded appeal or not. At least, I am confident that there are probably less than 5000 people in Nigeria who know more about rice than me.
Why Grant Lagos A Licence To Import Paddy Rice?
“Nothing which does not make economic sense will work ultimately.”
Giving a paddy rice import licence, despite the fact that its rice mill at Imota has not operated for five years, makes economic sense for the following reasons.
First, Lagos State, with population over 22 million, is home to about ten per cent of the nation’s people. Furthermore, every ethnic group in Nigeria is represented here – far more than any other state. So, the appeal has no tribal undertones.
Second, the State Government can easily raise the funds to import its own quota of paddy rice – irrespective of how much.
Third, finished parboil rice from Lagos, can reach the Southern States; far less expensive, than rice from any other place in the country; particularly the North.
Fourth, flooding in the North has devastated several hectares of rice farms; and more flood is expected later on.
As it is, the first estimates for harvests of all crops, rice in particular, are now totally off the mark. Nigeria will need to import more paddy rice than envisaged in July. That means the nation must issue more licences to importers of paddy rice than we anticipated earlier in the year.
It also means that the licences should be issued to those capable of raising the capital immediately.
Fifth, because the objective is to provide as much food for as many Nigerians as possible, instead of enriching a few rice merchants at the expense of millions of Nigerians, issuing licences to states with rice mills, makes eminent sense.
Granted, even the Lagos State Rice Mill must strive to make profit, but, profit-making is not its sole mission. And, the profit generated belongs to the people in general.
Sixth, and, this is perhaps the most important reason of all. Paddy rice consists of 70 per cent rice and 30 per cent waste.
Carrying paddy rice from Lagos ports to the North to be milled and sent back to Lagos to be sold is the most wasteful way to go about helping our people.
It means we would be transporting, at great cost, 30 per cent waste to the North and transporting 70 per cent rice twice – from Lagos to North and back again to Lagos.
Why not allow Lagos to have its own allocation of paddy rice and save all the freight? In fact, by allowing Lagos to have its own allocation of paddy, Nigerians will derive the benefit of having more finished rice at lower price.
What About Other States?
Just in case rice millers in other Southern States think that this plea is for Lagos alone, let me quickly explain that any state in the South with state-owned rice mill can be a candidate for the allocation from the Federal Government.
Eastern and South South states can have their paddy off-loaded at any of the ports closest to them; reduce the freight costs and deliver more rice to their people – at the lowest possible prices in each state.
Time Is Not On Our Side
“Procrastination is a thief of time”; as we were taught in primary school in the 1950s. Unfortunately, we were not also told that because time is also an economic variable, delay can be costly.
Orders placed now will generally be delivered. We will be in serious trouble if rice exporters place embargo on exports before we are ready to import. That is why Lagos State is an ideal candidate for licence.
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