ऑफ़ स्पेंडिंग एंड सेनातोर्स

“ a great famine caused by a credit crunch fell upon the land. The great prophets Mark and Bankole were sent by the PDP to the village of CBN, where they saw Umaru with his son Charles collecting taxes. Umaru, we pray thee, they said, give us the foreign reserves to spend. Umuru replied surly as the Lord lives all I have in my Foreign account is just $48billion, I am preparing a belt-tightening budget, to focus on education, health and infrastructure spending, so that can last us through this recession, if my reserves finish then me and my son will simply die. Not so, said the prophets, give us first the $48 billion “to eat”. Umaru obeyed the voice of the prophets and gave the $48 billion away, and they “did eat” , and then they all sat round a fire and died of hunger together. IMF be praised”.


Nigeria has proposed a deficit budget of N836.6 billion! Now this means we are going to spend N836.6 billion more than we have.

Note that we import everything in Nigeria, so To finance deficit we proposed amongst others to raise $500m bond offering, (that has now being abandoned) so no borrowing. So its either we spend our foreign reserves, print dollars or cut back on spending. LOL, cut back on what? Nigeria to stop spending? That’s like a crack addict cutting back on crack, Nigeria is addicted to spending. We can’t print dollars, so to finance the deficit we are going to spend out of the foreign reserves. fact.

So I say why wait, lets spend the whole money now. Spend it all while we can! I propose a stimulus package of $48 billion for just three companies, Julius Berger JB, HFP and Mikano Generators. I am proposing that the government give $48 billion which is the value of our foreign reserves to these three companies. their mission is simple;

1. For Julius Berger, build as much roads as they can in all the towns, cities and trade routes in the six geopolitical zones in Nigeria.
2. For HFP, build housing units in Lagos and Abuja. These guys have built 6,000 houses already. How many has Ministry of Works built?
3. For Mikano, (f#$k the NIPP), they are to import generators and supply to all streets in Lagos. If Lagos state can go off the national grid maybe, Enugu and Sokoto can get power. Maybe ooh!
Kalu are you serious? If we spend all our money on Generators and Bitumen, what will we have left? Ok we agree are “money miss road” but then your stimulus plan is irresponsible and more of the same it’s just more spending! Haba!

Yes it is. But lets spend well, lets spend on things we can see, that can last, things that can maybe restart our economy that has not recovered since the 70’s. if we don’t spend it now it will be given to the Houses of Reps and the Senators to pay for Uniforms costing N137 million and Meals and Refreshment costing N3.8 billion.

Kalu you are not serious, meals costing N3.8 billion? In this economic crises? that’s untrue, show us proof. Its right there in the 2009 proposed budget, in black and white. Meals for senators N783,000,000.00, meals for House of Reps N3,113,100,000.00 (classification numbers 021010002501001 and 021005002501001).

If JB was to build roads in all the six geopolitical zones do you know how many jobs will be created? Do you know what we will save on hospital bills on road accidents caused by bad roads? Do you know how much food costs will fall as farmers can get their good to the market? If HFP was to build 10,000 units of 2 bedroom flats, do you realize the amount of disposable income that will be released by the growing middle class to spend on other stuff apart from 2 years rent upfront?
If Mikano was to give every street in Lagos alone a generator, at least Barbers and welders will have work, 60% load will be taken off the national grid and the rest of Nigeria can enjoy PHCN’s 3,000 MW. Without power, there is no life, ask God; the first Ministry God created was Power ministry. PHCN is the devils copy.
Ok, ok but if everyone has a generator, what about diesel? Who will import it? , who imports the fuel in your car? Is it just one man? Ok but what about noise and pollution, now nko? Is there no noise and pollution? Since the central Generator has failed and the 7 Point agenda is still in the pipeline, let’s do this and see.

Point is if we leave this $48 billon, it will be gone in 2 years, shared out to the Governors and Houses of Parliament, it will not get to education (if it did, teachers will be on strike), it will not get to health (if it did Lassa fever and Meningitis will not be ravaging Nigeria), it will not get to Security (if it did then Oyinbos would not run to Lagos for safety) the money will disappear into N400m houses, N200m executive pensions and N35million constituency projects. FACT

When we had the first boom in the 70’s, we had congested ports also, as we imported everything, but Gen Gowan managed to build the Lagos flyovers and many a road. Can you imagine Lagos without those flyovers? This time we have had an Oil boom, congested ports but instead of roads we have a seven point agenda.
We sat down and the oil boom came and we did not participate (thanks to MEND), now we are going to watch the great disappearing foreign exchange trick, the President has raised the approval limit on how much contractors can be paid, CBN has removed the CBN figures from its website, so if it gets to $1 billion, we will only know when the sugar and milk lines reappear just like the austerity measurers that brought the “essential commodities” .

I’m too sad to vex, but it’s our problem; it’s not too late to fix it.

Kalu
disclaimer
Kalu does not own shares in JB, Mikano and HFP, but wishes he did. Consult your adviser for all investment transactions or you will be sorry. Shares have a nasty habit of going down in price.