Sanusi Lamido Sanusi |
The Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi ll, on Wednesday, faulted
the present administration’s economic model, saying it would not work.
Sanusi, who spoke at the Kaduna State Economic Summit in
Kaduna, the state capital, also berated northern leaders, saying the North-West
and the North-East remained the poorest parts of the world.
The monarch, who spoke on the theme ‘Promoting investments
in the midst of economic challenges’, said the North, as a region, constituted
the highest of the nation’s population, but lacked the necessary indices for
progress.
Sanusi, a former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria,
said the Federal Government was borrowing unsustainably.
He noted that currently, Nigeria was spending 66 per cent of
its revenues to pay interests on debts, saying such a model would not work.
Sanusi stated, “The Federal Government of Nigeria is
spending 66 per cent of its revenues on interests on debts, which means only 34
per cent of revenues is available for capital and recurrent expenditures.
“That model cannot work. If you look at the 2017 budget of
the Federal Government, I sometimes wonder what Nigerian economists are doing?
In the 2017 budget presented by the Federal Government, the amount earmarked
for debt servicing is in excess of the entire non-oil revenue of the Federal
Government, but that is not the problem. The problem is that it is a budget
that is even going for more debts.”
He wondered when the Federal Government would stop borrowing
if the government was spending 66 per cent of its revenues to pay interests on
debts.
The emir said government at all levels should realise that
borrowing had reached its limit and should therefore look for ways to attract
investments.
“Growth can only come from investments. It cannot come from
consumption. It cannot come from
government balance sheet. It cannot come from borrowing because you cannot
borrow unsustainably,” he said.
…faults loan from China
Sanusi also faulted the Federal Government on its plan to
borrow money from China.
The monarch added, “We have governors; they go to China and
spend one month on a tour and what do they come back with, MoU (Memorandum of
Understanding) on debts.
“China will lend you $1.8bn to build light rail. This light
rail will be done by the rail workers from China. The trains will come from
China. The engines will come from China. The labour comes from China. The
driver is Chinese.
“At the end of the day, what do you benefit from it? Your
citizen will ride on a train and when you ride on a train, in northern Nigeria,
in a state like Kano or Katsina, where are you going to? You are not going to
an industrial estate to work. You are not going to school? You are not going to the farm. You borrow
money from China to invest in trains so that your citizens can ride on them and
go for weddings and naming ceremonies.”
North-West, North-East the poorest parts of the world –Emir
He stated that the North-West and the North-East would have
been the poorest in the world, if they were a nation.
Sanusi added, “We are living in denial. The North-West and
the North-East, demographically, constitute the bulk of Nigeria’s population,
but look at human development indices, look at the number of children out of
school, look at adult literacy, look at maternal mortality, look at infant
mortality, look at girl-child completion rate, look at income per capita, the
North-East and the North-West Nigeria, are among the poorest parts of the
world.
“As far back as 2000, I looked at the numbers, Borno and
Yobe states, UNDP figures: Borno and Yobe states, if they were a country on
their own, were poorer than Niger, Cameroon and Chad.
“Nobody saw this because we were looking at Nigeria as a
country that averages the oil-rich Niger Delta, the industrial and
commercial-rich Lagos, the commercially viable South-East, and you have an
average.
“Break Nigeria into its component parts, and these parts of
the country are among the poorest, if it were a country. And we do not realise
we are in trouble.”
Sanusi said for the region to leap forward developmentally,
it must fix it social and religious problems.
He pointed out that women and children must be loved, not
beaten, adding that the region must do away with the 13th century mindset of
religion and culture.
Sanusi stated, “Other Muslim nations have pushed forward
girl-child education, they’ve pushed forward science and technology. They have
pushed forward the arts. We have this myth in northern Nigeria, where we try to
create an Islamic society that never existed.”
He added that the northern Muslims had adopted an
interpretation of culture and religion that was rooted in the 13th century
mindset, which refused to recognise that the rest of the Muslim world had moved
on.
He recalled that books, preaching love, were being burnt in
northern Nigeria, calling for a better interpretation of Islamic views so
that better life could be provided for women and the
girl-child.
Sanusi stated, “We need to understand the roots of the
problem of northern Nigeria. Burning books, it happened in Kano. What is the
crime of those books? They were writing about (love), and love apparently is
supposed to be a bad word.
“In a society where you don’t love your women and you don’t
love your children, you allow them to beg, you beat up your women, why should
anyone talk about love?
“We have adopted an interpretation of our culture and our
religion that is rooted in the 13th century mindset that refuses to recognise
that the rest of the Muslim world has moved on.
“Today in Malaysia, you wake up and divorce your wife; that
is fine. But you give her 50 per cent of all the wealth you acquired since you
married her. It is a Muslim country. In Nigeria, you wake up after 20 years of
marriage, you say to your wife, ‘I divorce you’, and that’s it.
“Other Muslim nations have pushed forward girl-child
education; they’ve pushed forward science and technology. They have pushed
forward the arts. We have this myth in northern Nigeria, where we try to create
an Islamic society that never existed.
“We are fighting culture, we are fighting civilisation. We
must wage an intellectual war, because Islam is not univocal. There are many
voices, there are many interpretations, there are many viewpoints, and we have
for too long allow the ascendancy of the most conservative viewpoints. The
consequences of that are that there are certain social problems.”
…knocks Yari over comments on meningitis
Sanusi also knocked
the Governor of Zamfara State, Abdulaziz Yari, on his comments on meningitis,
which has killed no fewer than 200 persons in the state.
The governor had, on Tuesday, blamed the deaths from
meningitis attack on the sins of the people against God.
But Sanusi said he was pained that a governor should make
such an outrageous statement when he was supposed to look for vaccines to stop
the deaths.
“I’m sorry about a current issue yesterday (Tuesday). Two
hundred people died of meningitis in a state, the governor was asked and he
said it was God’s curse on us for the sin of fornication, which does not happen
in America, which is why they don’t have meningitis,” he said.
The monarch, who has
a degree in Islamic Law, added that such
a statement shouldn’t have come from the
governor, insisting that he(Yari) should have treated those who had contracted
the disease.
He lamented that while Nigerians were thinking of how to
come out of the economic recession, the executive and National Assembly were
busy fighting each other on political issues.
Sanusi stated, “If you have been reading and watching the
news for the last one month, the big and concerned news politically is about
leadership but unfortunately, the conversation is not about electricity,
infrastructure, education, health care.
“All the conversations are about the National Assembly, the
executive, the judiciary, conflict between this politician and that politician
as well as confirmation of the EFCC boss.”
Appealing to politicians, he said, “Let us stop playing
politics and talk about education and health care. When we get to late 2018,
you stop working and politicise, we will understand that, but for now, it is
too early. You can’t be in politics for four years.”
The Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar III, berated the
nation’s political class at the event that attracted captains of industry both
from within and without.
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