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‘Only a focused leader like Buhari can turn Nigeria’s economy around’

By NIYI BELLO
26 January 2016   |   3:05 am
On the national economy One of the heaviest burdens that President Muhammadu Buhari is carrying on his shoulder is the problem of the country’s economy that is hanging precariously. Our economy at the national level is so precarious and so bad that we thank God that we have an elder like President Buhari handling it.…

Ekungba

On the national economy

One of the heaviest burdens that President Muhammadu Buhari is carrying on his shoulder is the problem of the country’s economy that is hanging precariously. Our economy at the national level is so precarious and so bad that we thank God that we have an elder like President Buhari handling it. I was asking a friend, who is also member of the Board of Trustees of our party, the reason the president not telling Nigerians one-quarter of what is wrong with our economy, he said doing so would damage our economy further by driving investors away. He said it was better the way the president was handling the matter right now. The economy of Nigeria is terribly, terribly, terribly bad. We are talking of only the corruption and stealing, the economy is bad.

I always sympathize with the President at each opportunity I have. I always greet him and say pele baba, God will see you through (laughs). I think honestly speaking, by his experience, by his age and by everything, what he is doing today is the best for Nigeria. He has put a budget we have never seen that will stimulate the economy. We can only continue to pray for him to succeed in this onerous task.

Although some critics are saying that the war against corruption is selective, I don’t agree with them. The revelations are so mindboggling that what I expect every Nigerian to do is to drop their partisan party toga and be united in our condemnation of this rape on our collective resources. Imagine that what we see in the arms scandal is only a tip of the iceberg. Like I said, Buhari’s coming at this time is divine and we all must support him to succeed.

Why I want to govern Ondo State

Ondo is the only South West state that is oil-producing which means that apart from the normal characteristics of that geo-political zone, that state derives money from oil production. The state also has mineral resources that are unique in the world today. Apart from oil, we also have bitumen and today, the asphalt with which we tar our roads are imported from Venezuela despite the fact that we have the capacity to produce asphalt in Agbabu in Ondo state.  The amount of money that we will use to manufacture our own is far lesser than what Venezuela is using to mine its own because Venezuela has to go hundreds of meters down to bring it out. In Ondo State, it is on the surface.

Aside from that, Ondo is the only state in Nigeria that has a coastal line and a thick forest that grows gradually into shrubs and savanna. What that means is that there is no crop that is being produced in Nigeria that cannot grow in Ondo State. In terms of tourism, from the coastal to the inland, it is like a journey from the plains to the hills. We have the Idanre hills, Akoko hills. And there are virtually no mineral resources in Nigeria that is not available in Ondo State in commercial quantity. And there is the quality of manpower in the typical Yoruba, brilliant and industrious. So we have everything that makes it sickening to everybody why we should share border with poverty. That is the state I come from.

One of our political leaders, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu once told me when I was apolitical, that people like me have no right to complain when things go bad. I found it unbearable that that state is one of the states that go to the Federal Government to borrow money before it could pay salaries. So this is one of the things that are pushing me. With my background in academics and even in parental training, I am prepared to do the job of ruling the state.  I was a certified teacher, an accountant, a banker and a financial consultant.

I was one of the six, including Rt. Hon. Adeyemi Ikuforiji, that turned international Bank of West Africa to Afribank, the first financial supermarket in Nigeria. That bank was grasping for life when our team was set up. We worked assiduously to turn that bank to one of the most active in Nigeria. That is the experience I am putting on board. When my friend was made the MD of Trade Bank, he didn’t know what he was going into. When he got there he saw a shell, a bank that was dying and he came to beg me to join him. I was torn between my career and friendship but I chose friendship and we made that bank one of the surviving medium-scale institutions. If I have been able to do that to other institutions, why can’t I do it for my state?

When Bi-Courtney was trying to build the only airport that is of international standard in Nigeria, I was their consultant. I did not only rebuild he image of Bi-Courtney in the banking industry I put together a consortium of six banks that raised the N20 billion with which the airport was built.  My own state, because I don’t have any other state I could call my own, is now in dire need of someone to take it out of the woods, from this state of comatose to life. I took up the challenge, because I want to be on the right side of prosperity. I offer myself because I have the capacity and the strength to make Ondo State the engine of national development, a model of democratic development and a state that would offer a thriving business environment for Nigerians and members of the international community.

Achieving same measure of success with the public sector

God has prepared me for this job because after rising to a high level in my chosen career, as a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria and as a member of Governing Council of the Institute, I still went to acquire more education and I read Corporate Governance at Leeds Metropolitan University in the United Kingdom at Masters level where I distinguished myself. So theoretically, I know how to handle human beings of any character traits or intent because intentions drive man. I have been trained to handle how to handle these conflicting missions of individuals to project the corporate objective be it in public, private or religious.

Coincidentally for me, I am just a friend to politicians, I have been their accomplice and my first closeness to governance was when Musa Ayeni was Deputy Governor of Ondo State. Some of us were the engine room of whatever were his achievements then. I was one of the very few people who could give money to my friend, Ibrahim Shekarau when he was contesting for Kano governorship then. We thought it was a child’s play, we were not even expecting that he would win because he just wanted to make a statement and God out of his mercy, gave him the sovereignty and he became governor.

I retired back to my office work in Lagos and about six months later, the gentleman called me and said you can’t put me here and leave me. I said what is my business with Kano, I am from Ondo State, you are my friend, I have done what I wanted to do. He said I should come for dinner and I went. There and then, he set up a committee that will be advising him and I was among the 7-man committee that advised him whenever things were critical. And don’t forget, in the history of Kano State, that 8-year tenure of Shekarau was the best in term of peace because I brought to play my training in corporate governance. So the point I am trying to raise is that I have the experience.

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