The Social media is replet with narratives that both show our enomous capacity for knowledge sharing and importantly, how willing we are to engage.
However, a danger with such a reality is that it easily becomes seemingly unnecessary to do any further checks. We becomes rather complacent having being so inundated and evidently intimidated by the volume of unsolicited information we get on social media.
There are mammoth of these stories beatifying the president. There are equally as many - if not more - that paint the president like a villain in children comics who poisons the product he sells to his own people so that when they become sick, he would sell them the remedy and when they all die, he would go take over another country.
Some of these stories present Tinubu as a grotesquely uncaring politician, so abysmally and deliberately plunging Nigeria and Nigerians into hardship.
Now, I am not a truster of any human, let alone a politician. Neddles to say that I have no trust in Tinubu or any politician to deliver the level of change that Nigeria needs at this time.
However, I trust systems and processes even if they are imperfect.
I should also point out that there are no perfect systems. What there is are people working on their systems and processes towards continuous improvement.
One of the biggest challenges with the Nigerian systems and processes is that of abandonment for a long time. We have become lovers of quickfixes so much to become deluded and removed from reality.
Of course, there are goodly efforts from time to time but most of these are quickly shutdown by those whose interest such moves do not cater to. Unfortunately, they always get their works done by the unsuspecting foot soldiers who take them to mean well.
Every careful observer of the Nigerian political experience - at least since 1999 - would tell you that the steps being taken by this administration are long over due. And while things may appear yet tough right now, experts both in and outside the country have noted that things would have gone worse than this if these steps had not been taken.
Now, a problem with this position is that how do we de one "worse"? How bad can bad get to qualify as worse? Is it not bad enough that things are not working? Can anything go lower than rock bottom?
These questions genuinely beg answering. And to get an idea of how bad things are, it helps to remember that before these reforms, we have been living on borrowed times. We were living in a made-up reality of having a robust economy whereas we do not know for a fact the true state of health of our economy. Our national economic outlooks where padded and made to look good?
There are many undisputable evidence that we were living on borrowed times. It was clear that we were moving in the opposite direction to progress. Yet all seemed to be well.
That's how bad it was bad.
But perhaps those were not the correct epistemological questions.
To truly know, and be able to validate how bad our bad is and to be able to distinguish between truth and opinion, we need to probe our situation further.
For instance, how did we get so comfortable with the idea of importing petroleum products and subsidising these importation while we have one of the best crude oil varieties in this region?
How did we go with the story that we have refineries, and huge funds were budgeted year on year for these refineries yet the NNPC could neither account for these disbursements nor justify haven collected payments way into future for oil contract that we may never be able to deliver?
How deep was our sleep to remain in that dream that we can continue to run such a sick subsidy system and expect progress?
Or do we doubt that the business of subsidy is undoubtedly significantly corrupt?
Here's a tip.
A certain Nigerian, let's call him Mr P, has oil blocks given to him by a former head of state as a gift. An oil block is your land that has crude oil buried in its grounds.
Mr P has friends in the Nigerian Navy who are in charge of large Nigerian vessels that can transport millions of barrels of crude and refined product on the high sea. These are not part of the over 70 vessels arrested by the Nigerian Navy in connection with oil theft between 2023 and 2025.
Mr P also has a refinery in Europe.
So, Mr P takes crude oil from his land in Nigeria. His friends in the Navy help him to move the crude to his refinery in Europe. He refines the crude and his Navy friends also help him to bring the refined products back to Nigeria.
On paper, Mr P brings in 100 million barrels of petrol. He get subsidy for bringing in 100 million barrels but sells only 50 million barrels to Nigerian marketers.
The remaining 50 million barrels, he smugglers to Niger Republic and other neighbouring countries and sells at black market prices making additional excessive profit mostly without paying taxes.
Government would believe that they just paid for 100 million barrel of petrol so everything should be fine.
This is a tip of the iceberg of the oil subsidy corruption. Now imagine borrowing or printing money to finance such a system.
Now, how does this compare with having a working private Nigerian refinery? What about the other investors already showing interested in building private refineries in Nigeria?
Even if we do not yet believe in the promising and favourable movements in the price of petrol, how does it feel to not have the traditional endless queues at filling stations during festive periods?
How does it feel, after a very long time, that we are now able to refine our crude oil at home?
Another evidence of working against progress has to do with how government finance all these subsidies.
Now, two main options to successfully finance national progress includes borrowing or burrowing.
As for borrowing, we had borrowed so much and squandered so badly that no one is willing to borrow us anymore at a meaningful interest rate.
We could have had a good leverage if our exports were substantive and in real sectors and of course, formally accounted for.
Alternatively, we could also burrow. By burrowing, I mean we could reach inward to collect taxes from at least the businesses that the subsidy was funding. But wait, were these not purportedly to help the importers and part of a relief system? Needless to say that how they were taxed remains unclear. However, our history tells us that the biggest tax evaders are usually the big corporations. Again, how would you tax income from illegal black market trade?
Here we are unable to borrow and hardly able to burrow.
So, we resorted to printing money including to pay for subsidy.
Do you still wonder why a reform was long overdue? Do you ever wonder how long we would have survived without these reforms?
It should interest us to note that while some of what we now experience is related to the reforms and they will pass if we reflect on our past, if we are resilient and remain focused.
However, many of the issues we are facing are the result of corruption fighting back.
Let me ask, do you expect those who have been making millions per day on subsidy to be happy, sit back and do nothing?
Do we wonder who can afford to spend millions of dollars on their kids' secondary education abroad while condemning our local private refinery in favour of importation?
How about those getting the dollar at N1 to $1 and selling same at N770 making over N700 gain on every dollar because their paddy is in CBN?
Now that they are no longer able to do that, do you expect them to sit back and not fight back? Expectedly, none of these undocumented and illegal black market trade are not paying taxes? Again, how would you tax income from illegal black market trade?
Do we still struggle to connect all of these with the insecurity in the country? How do we reckon these individual who fear loosing their corrupt livelihood bent on heating up the country?
How many honest civil or public servants or honest businessmen would spend their hard earned money to buy guns and employ and empower bandits? Would bandit employers offer a fat pay package or pay them stipends to keep them in perpetual servitude?
Now imagine a bandit realising how much his employer makes compared to what he who takes the most risk gets. What if he engages in side hussle banditry or goes into the business by himself becoming a self-employed bandit or form a new yet unregistered, non-tax paying banditry business with other disgruntled colleagues?
Do you imagine it written in their employment contracts to submit all company properties - including their weapons - to the security team when leaving the company?
What do we expect these disgruntled banfits who live their employers to do for a living, farming?
In case you are wondering, these categories of illegal businesses and quick money ventures are undocumented, needless to say they are never paying taxes.
Do you then wonder who is behind the unfounded rumours and aggitators against the new tax reform laws? Do you still believe taxing these super rich to finance national progress is a reform in the wrong direction?
I believe one of the genuine causes for concern is trust or the lack of it. Our history makes it difficult to trust politicians to genuinely work in the interest of the people. This is a global reality.
On the other hand, is the social and economic cost of attaining political relevant not in itself a recipe for corruption?
I mean, who would invest hundreds millions to obtain party nomination, fund campaigns and refuse to seek return on investment?
These are pointers that more work is needed to better our governance institutions, systems and processes. It will never be perfect but we can keep making it a fixer upper.
If, after coming this far, we still let corruption win because we cannot endure a short period of inconvenience for a promising future, we will have no one to blame but ourselves. The same will be out lot if we fail to fight hard to sanitise make our institutions, systems and processes stronger.
Remember sustainable corruption needs the majority to do nothing and it benefits only a few. However, sustainable growth is hard work, and it is rewarding for the majority of the population.
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