Oil Crash: If Not For Buhari, Nigeria Would’ve Become Like Venezuela – Adesina

Presidential aide, Femi Adesina, has said if not that President Muhammadu Buhari won election in 2015, Nigeria would have become like Venezuela where according to him “hyperinflation, starvation, diseases, crime and high mortality rates” are the order of the day.

Adesina said the story of Venezuela, “bears striking similitude with that of Nigeria” as both nations are rich in oil but were now facing the global challenge of crash in crude oil prices.

In an opinion article published on his personal website on Thursday, Adesina said “If not for a simple man from Daura called Muhammadu Buhari,” Nigeria would have been suffering the same fate as Venezuela today.

He said at a time, Venezuela’s problem was not money, but how to spend it.

“Just like Nigeria.And quite like us again, the South American country did not look inwards. It planted nothing, did not invest in agriculture, since there was an endless flow of oil wealth. Life was one long Christmas, and it was jingle bells all the way. But the rainy days came, as they would always come. And the bells stopped jingling. Rain began to beat Venezuela badly. Nowhere to take refuge. It did not buy umbrellas in the time of affluence, so no shelter from the rains.

Adesina said, “By 2017, over 75% of the population had reportedly lost 8 kg (19 lbs) due to hunger. There are interminable food queues, and people even cross the borders, looking for sustenance. At least 94% live in grinding poverty, more than 10% (3.4 million) have left the country, and 25% needed one form of humanitarian assistance or the other.

“How did a country that was once an oasis of pleasure get to this sorry pass? Simple. Economic mismanagement, sole dependence on oil. More than 70% of food needs were being imported, and why not, since petroleum-dollars were flowing. Then, the crunch came. Oil prices crashed, and Venezuela crashed with it. Just like it almost happened to Nigeria. Almost. If not for a simple man from Daura called Muhammadu Buhari.

“Imagine pediatric wards in hospitals filled with underweight babies, who still continue to suck the shriveled breasts of equally emaciated mothers. Close your eyes and try to envision hitherto middle class adults now rummaging through rubbish heaps for scraps, with the remainder of what used to be neckties now hanging limply over threadbare shirts and suits that have turned to ‘coats,’ looking more like parachutes on thin shoulders.

“That was what Nigeria almost became. Almost. And by today, with COVID-19 ravaging the world, all international borders closed, oil prices crashed and external reserves dwindling, that is where we would have been. If God had not brought Muhammadu Buhari our way in 2015.

“When he got to office as President, oil prices had crashed from an Olympian height of 100 dollars per barrel (it even went as high as 143 dollars), and then dropped to less than 30 dollars. Where were the savings during the boom years? None. Where were the foreign reserves? Mere pittance. Empty national treasury. Excess crude oil account, depleted. Nothing in reserve, local or foreign. The Venezuelan situation was at the very doors. But how did we avert it? How did we avoid the journey to Caracas, the capital of Venezuela?
President Buhari knew that we had to stave off the evil day by getting to work immediately. Whatever money we had left must be put where our mouth was, otherwise danger loomed.

“With a rallying cry, the President urged Nigerians to return to the land. They obeyed. God also showed mercy by giving consistently good rainy seasons back to back. And today, we can count our blessings.”

Adesina said the Buhari administration’s launch of the Anchor Borrowers Program in 2015 had “sparked off” an agricultural revolution in the country.

The presidential aide claimed that it was due to the success of the programme that the country was able to distribute palliative metals to the needed during the ongoing Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.

Adesina also responded to former vice president Atiku Abubakar’s criticism of the Buhari administration’s shutdown of the country’s land borders as an “insane policy.

“A presidential aspirant recently described the closure of our land borders as an ‘insane’ policy. May we have many more positive insanities. If President Buhari was not proactive, even prescient, to have closed our borders, where would local farmers be today? Every food product was being smuggled into the country, thus discouraging local initiatives. And when borders were closed, apart from the security benefits, local production of food items thrived-rice, poultry, vegetables , tomatoes, other food products boomed. Yet, somebody says it’s ‘insanity,’ because the selfish interests of buccaneers were affected. More of such insanities, please.

“The Coronavirus pandemic is severely testing our capacities to feed ourselves. And we are making a good showing, acquitting ourselves creditably.
Despite the crash in the global economy, we are continuing with key infrastructure projects, not borrowing to pay salaries as we did in the height of the 2014 oil boom. An army of entrepreneurs is being created in different spheres. All because a man from Daura had a dream, and turned it to reality,” he said.