Who Raped The Naira?

By Comr Fred Doc Nwaozor

The last time I checked, the Nigerian curren­cy, the Naira suffered a seemingly unpredicted rape though the identity of the rapist in question was signifi­cantly unknown. This critique was informed by the compel­ling need for every Nigerian to comprehend fully the overall no­menclature of the masked rapist.

The worth of the naira per US dollar almost peaked at N400 in the parallel market within the week as against its official ex­change of N198. Though it isn’t only Nigeria that is confronting the US dollar that is present­ly ravaging her once respected currency, naira and local econ­omy – some other countries are obviously passing through sim­ilar fate, but it’s pertinent to ac­knowledge that the ongoing misfortune of the said currency didn’t abruptly emerge; suffice it to say that the above mentioned ‘rape’ was apparently a foreseen circumstance.

Going down memory lane, it would be recalled that from 1972 to 1985, the official worth of the naira per US dollar was be­tween N0.66 and N0.89 involv­ing a consistent slight fall and rise. From 1986 to 1992, it was worth between N2.02 and N9.91 involving a steady fall. Subse­quently, from 1993 to 1999, its worth was between N17.30 and N21.89 involving an onward ap­parent constant exchange rate af­ter an initial decrease. Similarly, from 2000 to 2009, it was be­tween N85.98 and N145, which involved an outrageous con­tinuous fall. Suffice to say that this was during the President Obasanjo-led administration.

Then, recently from 2010 to 2015, we witnessed a steady fall from N150 to N171. And pres­ently, barely from last year till date, it has declined to N198 per US dollar, witnessing a free fall. The bone of contention is that ab initio, excluding the ini­tial point when it was ostensibly steady, there has been a contin­uous fall of the value of the naira when compared to the US dollar.

Hence, having painstaking­ly perused the above compre­hensive chart, I have succeed­ed in disabusing our minds of the notion that the fall of the ex­change rate of the naira either at the official market or paral­lel market commenced only re­cently. Needless to say that naira had suffered an untold hardship from the genesis till this mo­ment.

But if you take a closer glance at the above analysis, you would observe that it is during the democratic era that the naira’s value fell outrageously, although the origin of its downward de­preciation could be traceable to 1986 or thereabouts. In view of this assertion, one may be chal­lenged to ascertain the reason for such anomaly. 

Avian Influenza: Not Again

By Comr Fred Doc Nwaozor 

It’s only a-day old kid that is yet to realize that Nigeria is current­ly bewildered by the re-emer­gence of Avian Influenza, popular­ly known as ‘bird flu’. When Ebola virus was on board in the country some months ago, as an analyst and activist, in most of my commentar­ies, I categorically stated that Nigeria would surely overcome the scourge if we could employ severe and sus­tainable measures just as we did dur­ing the era of avian influenza.

To have used avian influenza as an instance as regards severe ap­proach towards containing an ep­idemic signified that undoubtedly every needed step was taken when the country firstly experienced the disease (bird flu) in 2006. To this end, the capital question that needs to be asked at this point is: why the re-emergence, or why is the coun­try experiencing the outbreak for a second time barely after nine years of its initial occurrence?

The country was able to over­come the said pandemic infection during its previous outbreak, spe­cifically in 2006, owing to the tacti­cal and drastic approach employed by the government and other con­cerned bodies. This implies that the re-emergence of the menace might not be unconnected with the fact that we went to sleep or on a recess; that is, apathy on the part of the con­cerned authorities and personnel re­garding sustenance of the measure initially utilized. In view of this as­sertion, it’s high time we are awoke.

Presently, survey indicates that seven outbreaks of highly patho­genic Avian Influenza have been discovered in Nigeria. Six of the A(H5N1) outbreaks were report­ed in the central and northern re­gions of the country, which affect­ed states like Kano, Plateau, and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT); over 21 thousand birds were re­portedly killed in the six outbreaks. Another outbreak occurred in the southern region of Bayelsa, affect­ing 8-week old pullets; 850 poultry died whereas 2150 were destroyed in this very outbreak. Officials said that farm workers visited other farms in the affected areas, which has great implications for possible infection routes and biosecurity.

Avian influenza is an infectious viral disease of birds particular­ly wild water fowls like ducks and geese among other such animals as pigs, whales and horses. Most avi­an influenza viruses don’t infect humans; however, some includ­ing A(H5N1) and A(H7N9) have caused serious infections in peo­ple. It is noted that outbreaks of A1 in poultry may raise global public health concerns as a result of their effect on poultry populations, their potential to cause serious disease in people, and their pandemic po­tential.