The Dollar Hunt In Nigeria

By Aniebo Nwamu

By this year’s end, I expect Nigeria’s foreign exchange hawkers to sell a dollar for more than N500. If oil price fails to climb up, and the Central Bank maintains its current policy, the dollar may hit N1, 000 before the end of 2017. Is my prediction frightening?

 

*Buhari

I’m not perturbed. The CBN is perhaps not perturbed. The rates I’ve quoted are found only in the black market; in the white market, a dollar is just N197. Last year, the then opposition APC promised to make $1 equal to N1. To fulfil its campaign promise, the ruling APC should wait for some time before applying former CBN governor Chukwuma Soludo’s redenomination idea by striking out three zeros.

There is no better route to take now. Rather than hint of an impending restriction of forex for medicals and school fees, as it did last week, the apex bank should act immediately. It’s time to exclude ALL items from forex allocations. Perhaps only then would Nigerians come to their senses and begin to look inwards.

The dollar hunt has taken hawkers and bureaux de change operators to Togo, Benin and even Ghana. They won’t get enough of it. Not until the Nigerian government reverses itself on forex allocations to criminals and importers of toothpicks.

And that’s what I dread most: the lack of continuity of policies. It’s one of Nigeria’s greatest problems. In this space, a fortnight ago, I canvassed supporting importers of medicines, agric equipment and fuel with forex at the official rate. Now, I eat my words. Ban them all! Let everyone that desires dollars, euros and pounds source them at “autonomous” markets.  I say so because I know what Nigerians can do. Anyone who gets forex at the official rate is likely to divert it to the parallel market: it is far more profitable to make 100 per cent profit instantly than import machinery for business, with all the risks involved.

Agony Of Chibok Parents

By Aniebo Nwamu

Until now, I didn’t believe any representative of the Nigerian government would raise their voice during a conversation with parents of the missing Chibok schoolgirls. Government exists to protect life and property, and, where it fails as in the case of the Chibok schoolgirls, it should at least feel guilty. I thought no Nigerian leader could look the distraught parents in the face and still speak words that hurt. 

I was proved wrong on Thursday, as I read with disbelief what “Mama Taraba” Aisha Alhassan told the Chibok parents during a meeting in Aso Villa. Here were agonising parents transported from Chibok by the #BringBackOurGirls (BBOG) movement to receive consolation from the powers that be. Here were parents expecting the presidency to tell them when to expect their long lost daughters. The presence of Hajiya Alhassan, who is also Nigeria’s minister of women affairs, must have reassured them that there was a mother who would protect their interests. How then could Alhassan, a mother and grandmother who is still hoping to be awarded the governorship of Taraba State, have spat on their faces?

“Mama Taraba”, first, told the grieving parents they were not invited to the villa. Then, she reportedly told them that the girls were not kidnapped under the current government, “so why are you harassing us?” As if the diatribe was not enough, Minister Alhassan reminded them: “You wanted schools, you wanted hospitals, you wanted this and that… you wanted so many things.”