Impact of the exit of National Economic Intelligence Committee – Part 1

During the era of General Sani Abacha (September 20, 1943 – June 8, 1998), there was the National Economic Intelligence Committee (NEIC) that had its office at the seventh floor of the Federal Secretariat, Abuja.

The committee was a co-pilot in the execution of economic policies for the country. Its work was later inherited by General Abdusalami Abubakar (81) following the death of General Sani Abacha and then by President Olusegun Obasanjo (87) in May 1999.  

The committee was established by Decree 17 of February 1994. It was headed by Prof. Samuel Adepoju Aluko (August 18, 1929 – February 7, 2012) from Ode in Ekiti State. Aluko played advisory to Chief Obafemi Awolowo (March 6, 1909- May 9, 1987), Chief Adekunle Ajasin (November 28, 1908 – October 3, 1997), General Yakubu Gowon (89) and General Sani Abacha (September 20, 1943 – June 8, 1998). He was very close to Ikemmba of Nnewi, Chief Odumegwu Ojukwu (November 4, 1933 – November 26, 2011) before, during and after the civil war.

The first military coup and the events that led to the civil war met him in Eastern Nigeria and it was at that time that he formed a personal friendship with the secessionist leader, Chief Odumegwu Ojukwu. In fact he advised Ojukwu to go into exile in Cote d’Ivoire instead of Togo or Tanzania or France. 

In one of his interviews with The Sun Newspaper before he died, Aluko explained that Ojukwu did not fully understand the average Igbo mind since he did not visit the Old Eastern Region until General Aguiyi Ironsi (March 3, 1924- July 29, 1966) appointed him the military governor of the Eastern Region in January 1966. 

Those within government will attest that the bond between Aluko and Abacha helped tremendously in the creation of Ekiti State on October 1, 1996. Instead of flying to Abuja via Akure or Ibadan or Lagos while serving as NEIC chairman, Aluko would drive in his Peugeot 504 station wagon car from Ode in Ekiti State most often carrying plantain from his farm during weekends.

Alhaji Lawal Garba, a friend, the son of a Muslim scholar in Kano and a businessman, is never tired of telling anyone how Aluko took him to Abacha to seek favour even at the detriment of Abacha’s close friend, Alhaji Dan Kabo.  He was a down to earth man, who practised what he preached. He never spared anyone if you are on the wrong route, no matter who you are, even if you are his first son, Professor Mobolaji Ebenezer Aluko (69), the pioneer Vice Chancellor of the Federal University, Otueke, Bayelsa State from 2011 to 2016. 

Aluko’s brand of economic policy was critical of ostentatious government spending. When he returned from London, he became an informal adviser to the Action Group. He was appointed to head its austerity committee which was set up to find ways to save money. The committee recommended the slashing of allowances provided to ministers and political office holders, an idea that was not well supported by some members of the political class within the party.
 
In 1962, Aluko was approached to serve as the economic adviser of the Western Region. His salary was to be £2,942. At that time, he was a lecturer at the University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University, earning an annual wage of £1000. He accepted the offer on the condition that his new salary be reduced to the level he was paid at Ife, stating that he would not be more productive at the new job than what he was doing at Ife. But this condition was rejected by the government. 

While Aluko was at Ile-Ife, he was a member of an informal advisory committee of AG, along with Professor Wole Soyinka (89), Professor Victor Oyenuga  (April 9, 1917 – April 10, 2010), Dr Odumosu and a couple of other lecturers. This group was strongly in favour of an idealistic party, a democratic socialist party that believed in curbing executive excesses.

The advisory group also split with some members of the political class in terms of how to engage with the national government and branching out of the Western region. Chief Obafemi Awolowo positively received some of the recommendations of this group but his deputy, Chief Samuel Ladoke Akintola who was now premier of the region, did not like most of the recommended policies.

In 1965, when Professor Saburi Biobaku  (1918–2001), the deputy Vice-Chancellor of UNIFE advised all lecturers to support the party of the day, which was NNDP, a splinter group of the Action Group led by Chief Samuel Akintola.  Prof. Aluko sided with Awolowo’s side of the Action Group whose members were receptive of the recommendations offered by the Ife group. Prof. Aluko offered to resign and gave a three- month notice, the resignation was accepted immediately and he was ordered to vacate official premises as soon as possible. He left the university and joined the Economics Department of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. 

Before the January 1966 coup, Aluko addressing a youth conference had tasked the youths to be less tribal and engage with one another to unite the regions.
His views on economic growth and public finance was less elitist and was to approach decision making by using the federal, state and local government institutions as an instrument of growing the national economy. Prof. Aluko’s view was drawing funds through higher rates of taxation and tracking tax defaulters to generate government income. 

In interviews, columns and public lectures, Aluko supported measures to increase workers’ productivity through better supervision and cutting of waste such as subsidised rent and allowances to government employees. These measures are capable of increasing government revenues that could fund policies to reduce unemployment and rural development.
To be continued.