NOW THAT BUHARI WANTS TO CUT EXPENDITURE.

Now that every minister and the President continues to assure Nigeria and Nigerians that the time to cut recurrent expenditure is now, let us hope they are truly serious.
If they are, three things are obvious:
1) Times that demand such decisions are not the right time to add to recurrent expenditure unless such is one that cannot be avoided for now.
2) Times that command such decisions are times for reviewing recurrent expenditure outlets that could be blocked, reshaped or reduced in line with the times.
3) Times that make it necessary for citizens to tighten their belts or cough out more in taxes, are times that demand transparency; absence of political egos and high sense of commitment to the common good.
Now if we take them one by one, the bullet to be bitten by President Buhari and his executive "noise makers" become obvious.
On point one above, yes the President and his party did promise Nigerian youths and school pupils lots of freebies but as events have since proven, they were promises made while being ignorant of the state of the Nigerian economy. Now, the times demand not stubborn determination to even hint at keeping such promises pronto but from the heart plea to Nigerians for these promises to be on hold so full attention can be paid to restructuring and reviving the economy especially with costly leakages attendant on insecurity still persisting.
It also demands buck stopping decisions on perennial macro economic running battles like petrol subsidy and "baboon dey work, monkey de chop"
Along the line of point two, there are so many expenditure templates over due for change primarily because they were put in place by regimes and all of us Nigerians while basking in so-called oil wealth. Now the oil wells are not only drying up, the West has found the fast lane to less dependence on the black gold.
Take for example the Decree 32 of 1999 which, holy of holies, sai baba, said was the reason he accepted two SUVs from Sambo Dasuki. Must Nigeria provide two top class cars; pay two drivers etc to ex- heads of state apart from monthly salaries?
Let us stretch the whole thing to the limit demanded by the times. Can Nigeria afford to pay salaries of baby generals and inspectors general of police retired before their prime by heads of state who were only quarrelling with their working tools? They are so many now, it is impossible to count them in a couple of hours?
And by the way how many of these ex's, from facts now emerging from only a peep into Nigeria's corruption empire, really governed without helping themselves to the till and end up with mansions and life style strange by Nigerian standards?
Based onfactor three, the times demand open dialogue between government and the governed. It is not enough to ask citizens to brace up for hard times, you must say how hard the times are, your strategies and priorities given the hard times and you must be seen too to be leading the bracing up as well.
Please enough of politics and loyalty testing.