How do you think Nigeria can best develop its economy?

Youth empowerment is the way to go. It’s that simple. The youths remain the core of our economic growth for the future. If we do not empower the youth, we are preparing to fail. They are the foundation for proper economic growth. This strategy has worked in the United States, Japan, China and elsewhere, and that is why I’ve returned home from the U.S. where I have lived and worked as a citizen to help build this orientation into our national planning and development policies. It’s so crucial that this is where the future growth of our nation lies.
Where and how can these youths be harnessed, given the current attitudinal disposition of this strategic segment of the population to nationalistic issues?

We start by going to the vocational and technical colleges to recruit them. It has absolutely nothing to do with religious or ethnic sentiments. The vocational and technical colleges are good grounds to select pupils from because they already have the basic skills. We recruit them from there, train them, give them entrepreneurship background information and prepare them for the bigger future through empowerment.

For instance, after training a student who has studied furniture making, you help such a person with about N200,000. That person, if properly supervised, can start up something as an entrepreneur. Rome was not built in a day. Gradually, such seed money can help the person take on bigger furniture ventures and subsequently enlarge in that market. But first, they need to be trained in specialized workshops designed to prepare them not to think of squandering the money. The training is to prepare them to properly manage finances that would be given to them on long-term basis. The whole idea is to make sure that we empower the people who have the right skills.

What happens to youths who have no requisite background knowledge?

For the youth who do not have the basic education, we have to empower them in a different manner. Right now, Toncia Consulting, a manpower training consulting company, is trying to encourage the local government to set up e-villages, which stands for entrepreneurial villages.

How it works is, if for instance, you have somebody who has started a mechanic workshop in the e-village, you can take someone who wants to learn to be a mechanic, attach him or her to that person and later there would be employment in a different form within that e-village. The place therefore serves as a training ground and knowledge sharing centre. So, if we can think of entrepreneurship village in every state, maybe one or two in a state, it will form the core for youth empowerment. Provided it is supervised and supported by the states.

How do you hope to achieve this goal?

My idea is to start with the vocational technical colleges. That is, those people who have the basic skills and empower them. If each of the 36 state governments, including the nation’s capital, can empower 50 of their youths every year, we will have 200 youths every four years who have turned out as skilled entrepreneurs. And if they can support those 50 youths per year with a seed money of say N200,000 each , it would amount to N10 million in a year and N80 million in four years to empower 200 youths. Spending N80 million to give a future to 200 youths is achievable and very affordable for government. Moreover, there is a multiplier effect in training 200 youths in four years. It would multiply to 300 in one or two years and it continues to grow. If this can be achieved in any sector of business, it would uplift the economy, since whatever these youths are producing would go into the market.

How do we guarantee patronage for these locally made products, seeing that competition from imported items may throw them out of business?

I believe it all depends on planning. Government has a role to play. We have to protect the creativity of these young men and women. Be it in Information Technology, furniture making, catering services, shoe making, hair styling, fashion designing among, a host of others. What we plan to do is take this message to the state governments. We would organise workshops and symposia, go to the mass media so as to educate the people and state governments to let them know that the programme is an avenue to empower the youths from their states. Many people know Toncia Consulting as an energy company, yes it is true, but the question to ask is what is an energy company without youth empowerment and human capacity? We also focus on training, oil and gas research, all these are all part of human capacity building. But the youths are the most important part of any form of capacity building. This is our core value.

Do you think there is a link between corruption and growth of non-financial sectors of the economy?

Everything hinges on the elimination or reduction of corruption. If we don’t have corruption, then we have a clear space for leadership to play its role. They can actually tackle insurgency. They make the right decisions at the right time. For education, health, security among others. If we don’t have corruption, then we would have the type of leadership that is aware of the grass root needs of the people. But before we can have that, we have to go to the basic cause of the nation’s problems, and that is corruption.

How do you suggest that Mr President should go about tackling corruption?

The first thing is leadership. Provide leadership by example. You have to know what type of leaders are coming forward to lead. Who are they? What kind of qualities do they have? What is their antecedence? Take for example the university system. The leadership of some Nigerian universities constitute problems for the leadership of the nation. You do not expect the NUC to micro manage the university; NUC will make the guiding policy, while the leadership of the university would ensure that those policies are implemented. For example, you have a HOD or dean in the university coming to work by 11am and when he comes to work, he shouts at the secretary and other staff to make his presence known. What are you teaching the students you are bringing up? You are teaching them that when they get to your position, they have the liberty to do the same. But if the leadership of that university makes it mandatory that the regular working hours is from 8am to 5pm, everyone works within that stipulated time.

However, the people at the helm of affairs should understand that if you are in a leadership position, you have to make a lot of sacrifices, which includes working outside of regular time. I was really impressed when I heard recently of one Vice Chancellor in one of the federal universities who went to an examination hall in a department and the HOD wasn’t there. The examination officer wasn’t there either. So, the VC had to ask the secretary of that department for answer sheets, which he began to distribute to the students. It took the examination officer over 45minutes to arrive the exam hall and the HOD was also not there. Right there and then, the VC appointed somebody else as the head of department. That is example of leadership that am talking about. And I understand that he continued that supervision in subsequent days, because people taught he would just do it one off and forget about it. But by this action he had already infused a sense of dedication into the university administration and that is example of leadership.

Back to Mr President’s scenario, he cannot be everywhere at the same time like the vice chancellor. He can however carefully select his team. If he has weak associates, then it becomes a problem. So, if the president can select candidates purely on merit and high moral grounds to do the work for him, it would be good. Like Mr President asked, which Nigerian can be trusted now? So, he has to be careful and take his time to select people who can do the work.

What is your take on subsidy withdrawal in Nigeria?

Really, we do not need it. During the perennial fuel scarcity, people were ready to pay N150 per litre to get fuel. Some people were even prepared to pay more, provided they get the product. At that point, nobody was complaining about the price, they were only complaining about the scarcity of the product. So, if government goes ahead to remove the subsidy in stages, I’m not sure anyone would complain.

The problem we have with removal of fuel subsidy in the last administration was lack of information and proper education. It was ill-timed. The masses just woke up on January 1 to the news that subsidy had been removed. Nigerians, I believe, would understand if they are properly informed and educated on why subsidy should go. If this is done, why not? We do not need fuel subsidy anymore. Because fuel subsidy is responsible for the mess we are in right now. The debt burden and over priced cost of subsidizing fuel. If government for instance graduates the withdrawal of subsidy in such a way that it is done quarterly, raising price of fuel to about N100 per liter, then in the next three months it withdraws again, increasing price to N120 per liter and finally N140 per litter, then people would condition their minds to face reality.

The next problem that would arise when this is done is hoarding, which has to do with the corruption we are talking about. But if we have a system that can check it, like the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR),which I understand has closed down over 20 filling stations because of sharp practices, that problem would be tackled in no distant time. So, the DPR needs to have adequate manpower to sustain regulatory duties from time to time, because whenever you raise the issue of availability of product and correct pump pricing, they complain about man power.

How do we handle economic backlash such as high inflationary trend that will follow subsidy removal?

Even with the subsidy on, are the prices down and uniform across the nooks and crannies of the country? Is life easier with the fuel subsidy right now? Is subsidy getting to the poorest of the poor. Are they benefiting? The commoners continue to suffer while the rich get richer. We do not have abundant fuel, yet we have three refineries. We are importing because local production is zero or not sustaining demand level. But if we start local production, then fuel subsidy issue will be a thing of the past because we aren’t going to be paying fuel subsidies any longer. So if we can get our local mechanization functioning, it would take care of most of this issues we are talking about.

Why are the refineries suddenly not working again after so much publicity that they would?

Obviously, there is nothing like they wouldn’t work. It is a matter of the right person, making the right decision. There is something called opportunity cost, what would it cost you to leave them not maintained as against spending money to get them functioning. These are machines, there is what is called wear and tear. So, we know that the problem we have in Nigeria is the capability to sustain what we have. We have giant ideas to build giant things but it becomes a problem, because we do not have the idea of maintenance despite huge funding. So if you have a gigantic project, it requires maintenance. Put it in the budget. The refineries make money so they should be a priority in the budget. That they didn’t work is not a cogent answer, it is just that people didn’t plan well for it to work.

Lots of wealthy Nigerians are today defaulting in loans they took from banks. Is this unusual?

Yes, it is unusual. It is disturbing that when you are looking for money, you beg and do things that ordinarily you wouldn’t do, just to get the loan and then say in the next one year, two or three years, you do not pay back. From that point, the debt keeps piling. Again, it all boils down to leadership. Whether it is an individual or corporate loan , there is leadership involved. In the case of leadership of the organisation that borrowed the money, the onus is on them to make sure the loan they obtained is paid back. And again, if the bank gives such a loan, there must be collateral. If there were collateral, what have they done with the collateral they requested. You don’t give millions and billion Naira in loan without any form of collateral, so when the banks start crying you begin to wonder what the collateral to these loans were. So if the banks collected no collateral before giving the loan, then they have created a loop hole which must be looked into. That means they have defaulted in the processes for granting the loan.

Don’t you think some state actors use their position to secure loans without collateral?

This is the system problem we are talking about. That somebody is at the top should not make the person the be all and end all. And that is what I think the president is trying to eradicate. The banks also have their own major problem. Why should you give loans in huge sums without collateral. What processes have you put in place to recover your loan? That you have written letters is not enough. Have you taken a court action? There should be a process for recovering loans after non-payment on non-performing loan for so long a time. By publishing their names, what kind of sentiments are you trying to draw?