[dropcap]T[/dropcap]hey had whole 4 years May 29, 2015 to May 29, 2019, to close the local supply gap on Rice and Crude Palm Oil demands within Nigeria.
They borrowed over N13.57 trillion /$44 billion in under 4 years and regaled us with lies and bogus tales of how they have closed all the rice factories in Thailand and how we are now self sufficient in rice production.
Their lousy and unthinking worshipers hailed them as performers.
4 years after , the same jesters , who regaled us with tales of how they have closed the local supply gap through local rice production, have now closed the borders of Nigeria for over 2 months now , to prevent the over $1 billion worth of smuggled rice into Nigeria from Benin Republic .
Rather than get infuriated and angered that these jesters have played them again, their worshipers are all over the place, hailing the border closure to prevent rice smuggling into Nigeria From Benin Republic as the next best thing after the creation of the earth .
WHAT A SANE, CREATIVE AND RATIONAL GOVERNMENT WOULD HAVE DONE SINCE MAY 29, 2015 TO CHECKMATE BENIN REPUBLIC AND COVER THE LOCAL SUPPLY GAP FOR RICE AND CRUDE PALM OIL.
If these jesters had taken time to abandon propaganda and taken the right steps since May 2015, we would have covered the local supply gap and by now be exporting rice and Crude Palm oil from Nigeria to other countries.
The N1.46 trillion that we wasted subsidizing the petroleum products and rogues in 2017, would have been more than enough to close the huge local supply gap we have in the crude palm oil market and rice production.
If the governments of the day had abandoned propaganda and focused truly in delivering good governance to the people , all we needed to have set aside to cover this local supply gap on these two key commodity and food crops are just N1.150 trillion
CRUDE PALM OIL PRODUCTION
With just N850,000,000, 000.00 intervention funds set aside at 2% interest rate per annum and employing just 249,000 Nigerians within the middle belt , South West, South South and South East, we would have long cultivated brand new 448,000 hectares of tenera or supergene species of the palm trees that would have provided us with the required fresh fruit bunch to produce over 1.9 million tons of crude palm oil in Nigeria.
This amount would have also been enough to set up 1000 units of small enterprise crude palm oil processing plants, each with capacity to process over 1.87 million liters of crude palm oil each per annum .
RICE PRODUCTION
With just N300 billion intervention funds at 2% per annum dedicated honestly and not diverted for rice production, we would have easily cultivated new 1.5 million hectares of rice farms in Niger , Kebbi and Jigawa states, while employing over 750,000 Nigerians.
The money would have been enough to set up brand new 775 units of 24 tons per day rice milling plants in these three states.
With dedicated intervention funds of N1.150 trillion , which is less than the N1.46 trillion that some fat cats misappropriated in 2017 in the guise of subsidies expenses, we would have been able to produce over 1.9 million tons of crude palm oil and over 3.9 million tons of parboiled rice.
We would not have been under the mercy of tiny Benin Republic if we had concentrated all our energies since May 29, 2015 into delivering good governance, instead of providing Liar Mohammed ministry with N39 billion annual budget to churn out lies and propaganda.
It is not yet too late to retrace our steps and do the right things.
Benin Republic is no real threat to us , if we decide to be honest to ourselves and put our house in order.
Let’s learn to govern honestly and altruistically and do away with propaganda .
Let’s do away with the corrupt laden Petroleum subsidies schemes.
Set aside just N1.150 trillion by doing away with the criminal and corrupt ridden petroleum subsidies and apply the funds to make Nigeria self sufficient in rice and Crude Palm production, while creating over 1m direct jobs .
These things are not sky rocket science.
It is well.
Nnaemeka Onyeka Obiaraeri is the managing director of Taurus Capital, He resides in Lagos Nigeria, You can reach him by email HERE.
The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
