TheCable

By Basil Okoh

The Nigerian economy is tanking. And so no matter the statistics and upbeat reports spewing out to the public from official and paid channels, the economy of the nation is on statis. “Nothing goes, nothing comes. It’s awful”, says Sam Becket in his dreary play “Waiting for Godot”.

Godwin Emefiele has cast a spell on the present management of the Nigerian economy. They can’t seem to do any better than the incarcerated Governor Godwin Emefiele. The new Governor of the Central Bank Olayemi Cardoso, a dour and middling banker, is bewitched by Emefiele too, to do exact same things, commit the same mistakes and pursue same monetary policies as Emefiele did and for which he’s been put in the crypt, while hoping to achieve a different result. It is indeed awful.

Cardoso floated the naira currency, got burned and came back to a dual exchange rate regime. Same thing as Emefiele did at some point in his eight year reign.

Cardoso is also borrowing $5 billion from the same agencies as Emefiele and on the same terms of tying it all up on future earnings from crude sales, creating the same transactional opacity for which Emefiele is now in the crypt.

He has also sold forward Nigerian gas for another $5 billion. Nigeria will earn no money from gas sales for another eleven years. Talk about eating up your future, but Emefiele didn’t get that far or brazen.

Cardoso seems, like Emefiele, unable to force government to dismantle the entrenched sleaze cabal in the NNPC, the supposed cash cow of the federation. NNPC as at today, is unable to remit petrodollars to the federation accounts from the increased sale of crude and nobody knows why.

With increased volumes of crude sales and removal of fuel subsidy, NNPC is still finding it impossible to remit earnings to the federal purse. Where is the money and what is the federal government not telling Nigerians and the world? Could the continued detention of Emefiele be tied to this mystery in the fiduciary issues of remittances from NNPC to the federation account?

Why is Adebayo Adelabu, Minister of Power, so deeply entrenched in the federal government when Godwin Emefiele is still held in detention. Bayo Adelabu was deputy Governor of the CBN in charge of operations when there were allegations of a missing $2.5 billion from the foreign depository.

Adelabu promptly resigned from the Central Bank as the whispers grew louder, only to be named later as Minister in Bola Tinubu’s cabinet. Adelabu runs free, Emefiele is incarcerated while the questions related to the “missing” $2.5 billion remain unanswered.

The government is on a spending spree pouring N450 billion to buy SUV’s for parliamentarians and other billions on a junket to the UAE while begging for foreign investors to help reinvigorate the static economy. The same Government is shopping for N35 billion to start steel production at the Ajaoukuta Steel Mills which has been in the works for over 45 years. Welcome to the dysfunctional state.

Whoever asks why they are still beating up on Emefiele while romancing his ideas and working on his template, does not really understand the nature of the deck of cards on the table.

Emefiele is not being held for what he did wrong. He is being held for what he got from the CBN and refuse to give up to the bullies.

They believe Emefiele ate up all the flesh in the CBN vaults and left only bones for the victorious crowd. So he must be made to give up something to cut the new crowd in. It riles everyone involved in the matter that the hunt has eaten up six months without Emefiele agreeing to give up something. Can you imagine that frail SOB not giving up something to the new owners of the barnyard?

My people say that you must follow the strange overfed dog to the end of the way. It will be forced at some point to either poo or vomit. Any of these could contain some treasures. Emefiele has refused to poo or vomit, so he is still holding on to the treasure that his traducers want.

It is how to make Emefiele poo or vomit that is the overriding challenge of this regime. So Emefiele must be kept in confinement until he poos or vomits so the treasure can be beheld and taken. Letting him go is to lose the treasure hidden in his poo or vomit.

Emefiele must be made to understand that men of the drug trade have their ways. They don’t let go.

Oko can be reached via @basilokoh