By Dr. Henry I. Balogun, Founder/CEO
of www.PrimeHangout.com
THE saying: “Fool me once; shame on you. Fool me twice; shame on me,” has never been more accurate. Inequality is no doubt one of the weapons of the oppressor. Those interested in absolute power and control could care less if the oppressed are cognitively unaware. They are more concerned about ensuring the oppressed are superficially satisfied, smiling, and acting like nothing is wrong. The oppressor does not intend to correct inequalities, listen to the voice of conscience, or stop their unjust posture intentionally. To them, their goal and desire are at the apex of their greedy ambition. In that case, “the end justifies the means.”
It is always the desire of those aspiring to control to continue for as long as it is ok to continue. If you think there is a self-imposed system of checks and balances on their behavior, you are setting yourself up for a culture shock and a bewildering rude awakening. Those with the upper hand are not expecting any nation or individual to challenge, dethrone them or, at a minimum, try to be like them.
Colonization sneaked into African society, unaware, only to gain such enormous control and dominance quickly. The betrayal of trust experienced created an unprecedented level of dizziness. By the time we snapped out of it and woke up from its mind-altering spell, it was too late to fight back. The stealth-like deception and conniving attitude that followed were too overwhelming and overpowering. “Ifa” and “Ejiogbe,” along with the “Ifa Priests,” as well as those practicing witchcraft, must have also experienced out-of-this-world unexpected culture shock. Neither could help the people they were supposed to protect or fight back valiantly! All of those we decided to worship and hold in such high esteem were out taking a nap (siesta) or on vacation when greed invaded and killed our people mercilessly. We did not have time to think, plan, or take any meaningful lifesaving or life-sustaining action. Everything that happened was swift and deadly; even when the world was not unaware that the activities of the invaders were morally wrong and sinful, no one lifted a finger to help.
We lost more than natural resources and treasures. We lost our dignity and God-giving rightful place in the world. Above all, we lost many of our sons, daughters, brothers, and sisters. We were ridiculed, laughed at, lampooned, abandoned, and reduced to the level of subhuman. If you think that was bad, what followed made us worse than the scum of the earth. The same people we thought were friends decided to hold us in bondage and made us serve the rest of the world. They threw us leftovers and whatever pacifiers they could find to soothe the pain. They made themselves superior in every way possible and renamed all our God-giving landmarks. We went along until we finally found the courage to say: “enough is enough,” thereby demanding independence and freedom to enjoy the land of our forefathers and our rightful place.
Even though there was no formal apology, and they did not ask for forgiveness, we made things look like they did. We put a band-aid on our wounds and vaporized ourselves while still praying for the same Kings and Queens who ordered such unspeakable cruelty. We cannot deny that we continuously worship the ground they walked on. We have accepted crumbs while enjoying meager living and marginalized status.
Our humongous inability to look within did not lead to true independence. We were continuously and undoubtedly paving the way for a substantial failure of epic proportion. The fact that we like to do things without attempting to intelligently evaluate what we are getting into, including our strengths and weaknesses, makes us look incompetent in the eyes of the world. It is equally unwise to embark on an idea not rooted, grounded in reality, and beneficial to our people. As well-informed and well-educated as we are, it always continues to burgle the mind how we fail to consider the pros and cons, including what to do to become stronger and better. Although essential, the need required to guide against laughable failure was never our priority or critical to us. Our focus has always been on what to eat and how to look good.
Our people’s minds are programmed to follow Europeans unthinkingly and genuinely dislike and hate us. Our lack of self-love makes made In Nigeria by Nigerians something to be ignored, abandoned, and laughed at. Our nonchalant attitude to quality products at home makes it impossible to embark on research and development. We are immature in every aspect of economic growth. You are a Nigerian, and people call you an expert in whatever. Your fellow Nigerians will keep you under a thick cloud of doubt and attack you to no end until you give up and surrender. How did you get the knowledge? Did the King or Queen of England knight you? How did you get there? Those who had never attempted to attack any European heresy will now come out of the woodwork and down on you like the wrath of God. Do you think you are better or wiser than many of us at home? There is no shortage of Babalawos in ambushing, ready to attack and destroy you. Once you and your ideas are forgotten and gone, you will see those who rose against you going to European countries for solutions to the same problems you were trying to solve at home. When will we eliminate the enslaved person mentality we inadvertently inherited?
On the other hand, if you are given a tiny chance and your progress is slow, those evaluating that slow progress are unaware that “Rome was not built in a day.” They are also unaware that whatever you do, you need time to perfect and get it right. If anything, Nigeria is at the forefront of this mind-crippling, anti-creativity and zero innovative approaches from within, which is why we depend on foreign goods and services, even technology. Suppose some Nigerian emerges as one of the people making headway outside the country. In that case, you can rest assured that you will be scrutinized, defamed, slaughtered in the court of public opinion, or at a minimum, abandoned entirely from within the country unless you go undetected to succeed.
A country where creativity and innovation are psychologically, socially, realistically, and systematically discouraged through inaction and inattention by the government, politicians, and financial institutions, including the media, is bound to remain stagnant with zero growth. In a country with zero growth, where manufacturing is nonexistent and innovation is discouraged, currency devaluation will give any would-be oppressor the advantage they have been hoping and looking for. The Nigerian government caved in and submitted to the pressure to devaluate our currency as suggested, even against the beginning objection by some highly informed Nigerians. We introduced devaluation but failed to encourage the manufacturing of goods and innovation.
In Nigeria, there is, currently, no support of any kind, including financial or legislative incentive, to help any Nigerian willing to do something. There is no financial incentive for any Institution of higher education to embark on research that can lead to valuable, life-changing, and better products good enough to export to another country. There needed to be an incentive to attract foreign companies to operate carefully regulated offshore facilities in Nigeria. The Nigerian media are not interested in providing free publicity to help propel great ideas in Nigeria by Nigerians. The general expectation of the people at home to Nigerians coming to establish something is that you have to pay your way through. Family members want their relatives who are coming home to do something to give them whatever money they brought for their project. Both the Federal government and State government are not interested in assisting any Nigerian or their already established entities outside of Nigeria to come home and establish businesses destined to create employment and positively affect the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The financial institutions in Nigeria are not interested in helping either. As I said earlier, the Nigerian government initially objected to devaluation when the IMF introduced it. It was finally accepted prematurely without the proper accommodation necessary to make it helpful.
Sending poorly packaged, unregulated, and sometimes rotten food with no expiration date to Nigerians in the diaspora does not constitute a sound and enticing export. Why can’t we produce excellent quality products with magnetic appeal strong enough to attract non-Nigerians to try the product? Whatever expectation from export can also be considered dead on arrival due to our inattention to quality and excellent packaging. Selling raw materials to manufacturers in other countries is not a good reason to shoot for devaluation of your currency. When you have nothing to export and innovation is almost nil, how do you take advantage of devaluation?
You must wonder what education means to some people, especially in Nigeria. Are we in school mainly to be able to speak English better than English men and women? The Bible says: “My people perish for lack of knowledge.” They are dying because the application of knowledge as ordained by God is lacking. Applying knowledge and not just attaining knowledge is required to take your rightful place in the land of the living. There is no meaningful, logical, and acceptable solution to real problems in a society where innovation is outright discouraged and quick and easy seizure, as encouraged by mythologies, continues to reign supreme. In that case, going back to the dark ages is the only available choice.
How is it so difficult to see that the devaluation of the currency has never led to economic growth? Devaluation will not produce the expected result in a society with such primitive and shameful behaviors where stupidity is glorified and civilized solutions coupled with quality manufacturing and ongoing innovation are nonexistent. Foreign companies are unwilling to establish offshore companies necessary to take advantage of the lower labor required to justify devaluation. Why is it so difficult for the Federal and State government to give science a chance by encouraging and funding research, science, and creative ideas?
Why are we so blind to the fact that exporting well-produced manufactured goods, not raw materials, is essential to balance the equation and place Nigeria on an equal level with any developed nation? As I said before, sending our raw materials to goods-producing countries to turn into valuable products for us insults our intelligence, destroys our economic system, and holds people in perpetual poverty. It can only lead to less compensation for labor at home and overwhelming dependence on goods-producing countries, even if the import cost is low.
We have become indebted to the entire world and fallen apart under the yoke of so much debt. When a nation cannot pay its debt with its currency but must buy another country’s currency to pay its debt, they are bound to dance in a way that pleases the one to whom they are indebted. How do you justify the pain of being denied the joy of living in your own house but the one built for you in which you must pay rent? How is that a solution?
Devaluation in a nonproducing society creates inequality and makes their citizens feel like they are worth less and less intelligent. Suppose your colleagues in the US are making $25 per hour. In that case, the devaluation of your money will force you to grapple with what is far less than that at home or even travel to the US to do a mediocre job that people with your qualifications and experience consider highly insulting. Those interested in supremacy now and forever will never stop imposing inequalities whenever possible. The cost of imports remains the same while workers at home, regardless of class, make less compared to the rest of the world. We need attractive incentives and a focus on valuable export significant enough to change the trajectory.
Suppose you want to argue that devaluation leads to the affordability of products in a nonproducing nation like Nigeria. In that case, I will say that you are one of the most naïve people on the planet. My question would be the affordability of whose products? Devaluation was initially designed to discourage imports and encourage export. However, in a nation where research, development, and improvement of local products, if any, meant to be sold to their citizens living abroad, including citizens of other countries, are nonexistent, devaluation does not make life easier but more complex and complicated. Attracting foreigners’ attention to our products was never part of the equation. Where is the intent to take advantage of devaluation?
When the Nigerian government favored devaluation, our obsession with foreign goods and the undue linkage of higher prices with quality were significantly discounted and underestimated. It is now more problematic when we must pay the goods-producing countries in Dollars as most of them would prefer. If a car in Europe, Asia, or the United States sells for $32,000, you cannot pay N32,000 but convert the suggested retail price of the automobile from Dollars to its Naira equivalent to give you an idea of its actual cost. If you think you know the cost of that product before going to bed, wait until the following morning when you wake up, and you will discover that the exchange rate is no longer what it was the night before but higher. The goalpost of what you think you can barely afford has been moved further. You now must play and kick the ball harder than ever before. We are like a man running in a race. The one running behind “must run faster than the man in front.”
Realistically speaking, the devaluation of the currency in Nigeria does not have the expected negative and discouraging effect on imports. The supposed positive impact of export needed to make life easier at home needed to be more adequately considered. We did not prepare for the first step but went straight to the second step. For emphasis, the first step would have been to encourage the production or manufacturing of goods at home sufficient and of better quality before taking such a massive action of devaluation. We are one of few countries with deadly obsession and attraction to mesmerizing and mind-chattering technologically advanced, improved, and life-changing products from developed countries. Domestic products cannot compare or close enough to help us level the Plainfield. Currently, we need to be more capable of competing successfully.
We underestimated our craving for brand names and for whatever goods were made elsewhere. It makes Nigerians look unintelligent and incompetent and puts us on a leash held by the rest of the world. We cannot look within because there is nothing to desire from within. We are not asking the countries producing what we like to establish offshore manufacturing in our country, thereby taking advantage of lower labor. China has been doing that for years. It is one of their backbones and strength. The main manufacturing plant of Apple, one of America’s leading companies in technology, is in China, taking advantage of devaluation. There are so many other countries doing the same thing.
In the case of the automobile I talked about earlier, it does not matter; the dealership must collect the Naira equivalent and pay the automobile manufacturer, not the Naira equivalent in Naira but the Dollar equivalent in Dollars. That kind of transaction leaves the Dollar stronger and the Naira weaker. What a destructive and ungodly platform for inequality! Why can’t we pay our debt in our currency? There is no better way to help our economy! However, we are helping other countries through our inability to produce while encouraging their desire to indirectly hold us down and tell us how to live our lives. The truth is that the Nigerian government, politicians, and media need to promote manufacturing and innovation from within. They should also encourage Nigerians in the diaspora to do the same great things they are doing abroad by providing free publicity at home to lift their spirits.
Considering the current salary scale, how many people can afford that automobile? Only a few! Where does that leave most people who would have loved to reward themselves with such luxury? They are left to wallow on the lonely island of deadly jealousy, an unspeakable crime likely to send them to jail or end their lives prematurely. The inability to afford what you would have loved to enjoy can lead to envy severe enough to make people turn against one another.
The devaluation of the currency was also designed to discourage foreign travel by making it more expensive, encouraging vacations within your country. That is wishful thinking. Even though we have many, Nigerians are obsessed with “Ilu Oba” and not any of Nigeria’s “Ilu Obas.” I am not under the illusion that import and foreign travel can be abolished entirely but should be curbed in the interest of a strong economy.
Nigeria should appeal to any evil empire trying to suffocate us by taking advantage of our self-imposed gullible stance. If they fail, we will have no choice but to close our borders to anything made in their countries.
An American philosopher, poet, and environmental scientist Henry David Thoreau wrote an essay. Thoreau’s essay on Civil Disobedience, published in 1849, “was a call to arms.” In the article, “Thoreau argued that people owed it to themselves and their fellow man not to blindly follow their government if they believe their rules and laws are unjust.” This essay “was partly motivated by Thoreau’s dislike of slavery and the American government’s support of it.” The same can be used to let any country or entity know that unjust interactions, regulations, and rules cannot be tolerated anymore.
To say that the Nigerian government is incapable of capping devaluation, thereby stopping it from falling every time we blink, is like allowing someone to be threatened and murdered at will because the Law Enforcement Officers are incapable of protecting. That negates and abandons the call of duty. Volatility in devaluation must end until we can solve the problem of lack of manufacturing and innovation. When trying to get our acts together, that is not the time to impose an undue burden on ourselves. We need well-informed cooperation at every level. There are some of us willing to introduce a new automobile to the world, develop a better App, join space exploration, make gasoline cheaper at home, or make a better bike or mouse trap. Until that is not done, the job is not done.
