Random musings over Emilokanomics
By Clem Oluwole
The year 2025 is 11 days old already. It seems the 11-day-old baby has hit the ground running without crawling let alone toddling as though we are in for a monkey business. It is the primates that are famed for hitting the ground sprinting. But why the hurry? Just laugh it off, folks.
Indeed, last year was tough and rough particularly for the hoi polloi. Not many would wish to sight or experience a year like 2024 again. Perhaps, only the corrupt politicians and evil servants (I meant civil and public servants) that have unfettered access to government’s till had it rosy. The repercussions of the fuel subsidy removal and the floating of the forex – two major policies announced by the Tinubu administration rooted in Emilokanomics – drove many Nigerians to the edge of despair. With the fuel prices unhinged and the exchange rates on a freefall, prices of goods and services took a flight of no return(?)
Expectedly, the Nigerian factor has rushed to the centrestage. Even goods and services that have no direct connection with the policies are loaded into the inflation bandwagon. For instance, house rents have shot through the roof especially in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). I am aware the rent hikes have become a national phenomenon but it is worse in Abuja, the nation’s capital, and the satellite settlements where rents have been hiked by between 100 or 150 per cent.
Shylock landlords and landladies, who think everyone residing in Abuja has access to slush money, blamed the phenomenon on astronomical costs of building materials and labour. While it is understandable with new houses, owners of old houses are not left behind in the madness. For them, what is sauce for the goose is also sauce for the gander. The houses are their investments… old or new. “Take it or check out” has become the sing-song their hapless tenants must dance to.
All categories of houses are affected… from face-me-I-face-you, one-bedroom, two-bedroom, three-bedroom flats/bungalows to duplexes. The house owners, especially those in the FCT, have all gone nuts with no psychiatric solutions, except the Minister, Barr. Nyesom Wike, is persuaded (by the plight of the tenants) to direct his tsunami to the sector by setting up Rent Control Tribunals to cast the demons of greed out of them! Did I hear you say such tsunami could only occur in my dreams? Well, you cannot predict Wike.
Someone even suggested that the implementation of the national minimum wage is another reason for the rise in the insane overpricing of commodities in the market on daily or hourly basis. A couple of days ago, I was with a yam seller in my Kubwa neighbourhood. She expressed her worry over the refusal of prices of foodstuffs to climb down despite the reduction in the PMS prices. We both reasoned that if prices of foodstuffs climbed up because fuel prices were jacked up, why would the prices not respond to the reduction in the prices of PMS? That was why the new minimum wage is fingered as an invisible accomplice!
Many believe that with the Port Harcourt and Warri Refineries joining the Dangote multi-billion dollars Petroleum Complex in the domestic refining of crude oil, the pump prices of PMS will continue to plummet. What is more, there is the Bua Refinery and other modular refineries also warming up to saturate the market. There is a cautious optimism in the air that prices of PMS may hover around N500 per litre before the end of this pacy year, thus obeying the law of gravity that teaches us that what goes up must climb down. By so doing, high prices of goods and services blamed on exorbitant transportation costs would no longer be an excuse. They would be jacked down too. Then, there is the CNG initiative that is blowing like harmattan wind. CNG-powered vehicles are like a miracle on the highway when collocated with the PMS-driven ones. However, the snag is the high cost of conversion. Most truck owners are switching to the CNG and this should impact on the costs of goods and services blamed on the high costs of PMS and diesel.
Many folks, including the traducers of this administration, are following thefallouts of the Emilokanomics with cautious optimism as prices of PMS are gradually plummeting. They are hoping that it would turn out to be a nine days wonder. And that the graph would swing up again soon. May their wish perish in their minds. Amen.
With the other corner of the eye, attention is turned to the naira which has received a thorough bashing and brought the value to an all-time low in its 52 years of history. In its nadir (under the Emilokanomics), the value of the local currency dropped to close to N2,000 to a dollar. I could not but wail for the poor naira when I remembered that as recently as the 70s and early 80s, you could purchase the now almighty dollar for 50 kobo! Yes, you heard me.
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Presently and strangely too, the exchange rate is also obeying the law of gravity. It now waltzes around N1,500 to a dollar which is the official rate, and about N1,600 in the parallel market. Hopefully, with less pressure on the demand for dollars following non-importation of petroleum products, naira will further appreciate.
The collapse of the manufacturing sector leading to importation of goods is another major factor causing the local currency to hemorrhage. The ogre that frightened manufacturers away from the scene was the epileptic electricity supply… the critical infrastructure that feeds the economy. Consequently, most of the manufacturers shut down their factories and fled to the neighbouring countries like Ghana where power supply was as constant as the northern star. Surprisingly, wealthy men of God bought most of the premises… to continue from where the industrialists left off, right? Wrong! They converted the premises to church auditoriums where counterfeit or make-believe miracles are manufactured and sold to the gullible, lazy Nigerians. Ironically also, millions of jobless youths converge on these churches day and night to pray for employment! What a country, this Nigeria.
The good news is that the power sector is now liberalised. Every Tanimu, Dike and Haruna as industrialists can now generate their own power other than through the generators that cost a fortune to run. Once the manufacturing sector sneezes back to life and locally produced goods are all over the place like ants on sugar and at affordable prices, there will be less demands for the boastful and haughty dollars, Euros and Pound Sterling.
There are myriads of issues to muse about. However, I will like to pause here for now. Wishing you all a museful weekend. BLUEPRINT
