Are we piloting inflation as an agent of insecurity? -By Abdu Abdullahi

“Inflation is the parent of unemployment and the unseen robber of those who have saved.” ~Margret Thatcher

For sometimes, life has extremely been difficult for the masses as a result of the untold hardships the predominant and aggressive inflation has caused in the country. Most Nigerians feel great agony when they go to the market or a shop to make some purchases because prices of food items and commodities are daily increasing but their purchasing power dwindling at an alarming rate.

Consequently, poverty increases as a result of diminishing income, which culminates in hunger and hunger degenerates into violent anger. Of course, an angry man is a potential danger to lives and properties. Inflation now is a dreaded economic disease afflicting the masses who cannot afford three square meals per day in Nigeria. Inflation is currently coersing the masses to bear the unbearable suffering that is spreading despairs in many homes. It has broken down many families into pieces and ursurped their happiness. It has also generated massive unemployment as many factories are folding up, laying off their workers owing to high cost of production courtesy of Naira devaluation. Indeed, it has incurred many socioeconomic destructions which will be hard to reconstruct.

The trouble with our governments is prescribing the wrong therapy for economic ailments. History has taught us that currency devaluation, recommended by our foreign creditors, has been doing more harm than good to our economy. Recall that former military ruler General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida’s deep romance with the Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) only succeeded in the economic enslavement of most Nigerians, widening the gap between the rich and the poor.

More than three decades after the imposition of SAP, its negative repercussions, with currency devaluation as its mainstay, are still living with us and following us like a shadow. At the commencement of the infamous SAP, the late erudite economist Professor Sam Aluko had prohesised that the real effects of SAP would not be felt until after ten years. Has Aluko not been vindicated? But unfortunately, most of our leaders fail to learn the good lessons of history to make a breakthrough.

The Buhari regime, right from its inception, did not start on a good note. Despite the fact that boosting the economy was a cardinal principle of his campaign promises, yet he woefully failed to assemble the best economic team that would weather the storm and deliver on the pledge. Many experts on economy including two former Central Bank Governors, Professor Charles Soludo and Malam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, warned the Buhari Presidency of the impending dangers of the poor handling of the economy. The poor result now is that the economy is worse that he met it when he took over the mantle of leadership in 2015. For instance, the money that a common Nigerian can buy a bag of rice could be used to purchase three bags of the same rice in those years!

The worst part of it is that the government has remained adamant to the rising cost of living in the country. It has not initiated any positive step to soften the adverse effects of this economic crisis and is left to resolve itself. This I don’t care attitude of the government has given rise to general feeling of disenchantment for which the masses have withdrawn their loyalty to the government. This reminds me of Mark Twain’s assertion thus, ” Loyalty to the nation all the time. Loyalty to the government when it deserves it.’ It is a well known fact the present government has lost many loyalists as a result of its poor performance which the authorities still don’t acknowledge in order to redress.

In the Northern Nigeria where the rate of poverty is higher than the Southern Nigeria, many youths are vulnerable to the activities of the brutal gunmen. They find it very convenient to lure the unemployed ravaged by inflation to sustain their terror acts to the next level. It has been observed that not long after the closure of land borders in Northern Nigeria, insecurity started gaining ground because poverty is the twin brother to insecurity. They can never be separated because they complement each other to make living very miserable for the populace. This symbiotic relationship, analysts argue, denied many youths their means of livelihood who engaged in econonic activities around these border areas. They have been rendered jobless without any legitimate alternative. With soaring prices of goods, they are becoming poorer and poorer and remember that a frustrated mind is indeed a devil’s workshop.

In this trying period of the masses, inflation is wearing two distinct faces. One face is very attractive and compassionate to the extremely rich and the other horrible and hostile to the masses. Undoubtedly, inflation is a notable but notorious symptom of capitalist ideology in which human piety is not duely recognized but capital accumulation. Since our inflation is sourced from capitalist dimension, it does not reflect and operate on the parody of human passion.

Capitalism has three evils to present according to analysts. But the most dangerous amongst the three, which is winning in Nigeria, is popularly known and addressed as INEQUALITY. When inflation strives in a capitalist surroundings such as ours, the evil of inequality rears its ugly head, favoring those who are in the stronger bargaining position. And for emphasis sake, the Northwestern Nigeria where it is the most dangerous region to live now in Nigeria is characterised by inequality which has undergone several stages of transformation. We are now paying bitterly the exorbitant price of this social disaster.

As a result of the persistent increase in food prices caused by border closure to boost food production, restrictions in the forex market and insecurity predominantly in the Northeast states, the misery situation of the poor has heighted. The inflationary trend was further aggravated when the anti EnSARS protest against police brutality hindered and limited the movements of goods and persons, services across most cities and rising cost of transportation. These are some of the factors that have taken us to where we are now, living with a little hope.

The government has sanctioned currency devaluation to continue making life more difficult for Nigerians for its own economic reasons. Only last month, a Dollar was sold at more than 700 Naira! This is the worst performance of Naira in the history of Nigeria. But the government insists that it is spoiling our money to increase the balance of trade by improving competitiveness of domestic goods in foreign markets, making foreign goods less competitive in the domestic market by becoming more expensive.

But let us face the reality to avert economic chaos. In the history of currency devaluation, nine countries had to replace their currencies because they lost their purchasing power to the barest minimum. Such countries included Weimar Republic, Hungary, Chile, Argentina, Angola and Zimbabwe amongst others. In fact, the currency depreciation of the Weimar Republic was so terrible that between 1921 and 1923, it caused considerably internal political instability as well as misery for the general populace. If this currency depreciation persists, very soon our currency will also undergo a similar experience of currency replacement. As of now, the downfall of the Naira is an economic assault against ordinary Nigerians who live from hand to mouth.

The earlier the government recognizes inflation as a reckless vehicle that has the potency of complicating insecurity, the better for the nation because the government’s gains from inflation is the masses’ massive lose for which the dire consequences are enormous.