AS THE GOING GETS TOUGHER

No doubt, the going is getting tougher today in Nigeria.
On the part of the government, the present times are not what President Buhari or any of the present day political leaders bargained for. It is certainly too tough because they have far less to spend and less room to recoup huge campaign expenses.
Besides those who would have preferred to be branded as saviours of our time find themselves battling with months of unpaid civil servants wages and abandoned projects galore.
To worsen matters many with their eyes fixed on populist applause find themselves having to take and sell decisions that hurt many on the street. Indeed none is to be envied.
On the part of the governed, hopes raised so high by the change mantra have been punctured too soon. Cost of living is on the increase everywhere even amidst stagnant or unpaid salaries; insecurity refuses to be wished or commanded away and every day the nations political space gets heated to boiling point.
Yet let us face it, the whole thing is not in the hands of any Nigerian. The tunes continue to be dictated by foreign exchange earnings from crude oil and dwindling government revenue.
So what do we do as Nigerians?
First let's look at the sources and kind of pain Nigerians now feel. There is the pain from higher prices for imported or hitherto smuggled products like Rice which has since become everyday delicacy, fruits, second hand clothes, tomato puree, cars and so on.
Then there is the pain from prices occasioned by higher cost of input raw materials, process technologies and imported expertise. There are also pains from locally products now churned out with lower quality or quantity for the same old price.
Then finally there is the pain of unreliable but more costly utilities especially power supply, water, roads, education and healthcare.
So what do we do? Simple. Each pain we feel offers us a chance to look inwards for solutions.
Yes finding alternatives may not be that easy any more for things like Rice and petroleum products but alternatives do exist that could help curb this nations appetite for imported goods.
Yes too some of the pains will force us to be more efficient consumers. For example the cheaper the petrol and car care the less tendency for any one to question car usage pattern in a family yet each efficiency achieved at any level is value added to the national economy.
Another example may make the point clearer. Before the crash of 2008 it made little sense for any bank to outsource jobs that could be paid for at non-banking industry rates. Now those jobs are mostly outsourced now and offices still get cleaned at non-banking wages.
Do you know that in the oil industry, even when you get sacked by tough talking political leaders, you end up smiling to the bank where you generous handshake awaits You? Now tell me what the times demand in present day circumstances? A second look at not only such handshakes but also at what is paid to political leaders, to sweat masters called coaches, to everyone who got what he got because there was oil boom, beg your pardon, oil doom.
Thus as much as possible just like a doctor who must continue with the child birth in spite of the labour pains of the mother to be, so we must stay focussed on developing import substitutions, curtailing our national appetite for imported goods, deliberately developing our local content and capacity and support for local and technology.
Moaning the fate of the Naira at the black market is not the way out. Picketing because of price increases is also not the way out.
In the times we are it is not what pleases the masses or the rich that will save the situation for good but deliberate inward look that allows for exceptions only temporarily.