I started this series of columns looking at how the Buhari administration can start to improve the environment for commerce and encourage new investment. After security and corruption, a key concern has always been the ‘ease of doing business’ in Nigeria. I have argued that using the Stephen Oronsaye report as a starting point will significantly improve the business environment as well as reduce current expenditure and improve effective governance. I am a great believer in sending the right message early on. It will help communicate the new team’s credibility and focus if they can take immediate steps that are symbolic of their new approach. There are several opportunities for quick wins that will send that signal to potential new investors into the Nigerian economy.
Let me suggest that in boardrooms around the world there are regular discussions about where to invest. There will be those arguing the case for Nigeria and others in favour of our lower risk competitors in Africa or the Far East. These companies will be sending senior executives to undertake research and due diligence before finalising their decisions. These organisations may have been here before or they may be potential new entrants attracted by our political changes. Their first stop on this journey is to obtain a visa. Yes, their very first exposure to Nigeria as a potential new investor will be an expensive and corrupt process designed as a knee-jerk ‘tit for tat’ response to some foreign government’s visa requirements and then even further distorted in order to earn officials kickbacks. Here is an immediate opportunity to create a symbol or send a signal of the new government’s intent. Let us discard the current bungling process, punish corrupt officials and create a genuine visa-on-arrival system like most of our competitors. (Please do NOT tell me we already have one! Have you tried to use it? Do you know how many serious visitors have been turned away from boarding at the airport gate or sent back after landing here with some documentary error?)
So, the person we want to write a recommendation to his board for investment in Nigeria lands at MMA, his first ever experience of Nigeria. What a way to welcome him! As the plane lands, the badly-maintained runway bumps and bounces him around as he hears Nigerians in economy behind him applauding. Then he waits while the aircraft is manually towed to the point of disembarkation because we have not invested in modern jet-bridges. As he enters the airport a stream of non air-conditioned hot air follows his walk alongside inoperative walkways and sleeping NAHCO staff down a broken escalator. I could continue with descriptions of the touts, the wait for luggage, the car park and collection points but I think my point is made. If he gets sent to Jo’burg, Cape Town, Accra or Kigali, what is likely to be his initial experience compared to this? Herein lies another opportunity for the new administration to send a signal. If they REALLY fix the airports, investors, tourists and even our own people would take note. Let’s face it, the last ‘facelift’ was undertaken by a minister so corrupt that even GEJ had to sack her! Please let’s do it properly this time!
This and many other opportunities to make a quick difference and send out a series of symbolic messages that change has come will arise from what we hope can be a new, fresh relationship between the federal and Lagos State governments. People would really applaud if President Buhari acts swiftly to sort out the collapsing federal roads and bridges in Lagos – especially in Apapa. As over 90 percent of imported raw materials and equipment comes in through Apapa ports, this will also immediately impact positively on business. In the longer term, the federal and Lagos State governments can work on relocating many of the fuel tanks and permanently decongesting this critical area. I could continue as there are so many quick wins, relatively small in the scheme of things but significant in their immediacy and the signal they send.
President Buhari and his team are under pressure to a probably unrealistic degree for instantaneous results. There are many major components of this economy and our social development that will take more years than will be available to any single administration to deliver. However, there are opportunities to send a clear signal of their intent. These signals in themselves may not change the lives of ordinary Nigerians overnight but they will contribute to the freeing-up of recurrent expenditure for infrastructure, attract much-needed investment and build a sense of purpose. Building early momentum with symbolic quick wins will give the new team credence and positive public sentiment and buy them time for the tougher longer-term decisions.
As Abraham Lincoln once said, “Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed. He who moulds public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or decisions possible or impossible to execute.” It has been a long time since Nigerians have had leaders who can build trust and public sentiment. President Buhari has to work quickly and boldly if he is to demonstrate clearly that he is that man.
Keith Richards
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