This is a government thatsigned an agreement with us on January 24, 2012, to the effect that they would inject N100 bn as funding into the universities in the first month; and that before the end of 2012, they would inject another N300bn."
Dr Olusegun Ajiboye, ASUU University of Ibadanbranch chairman, August 14, 2013.
Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala increasingly is cutting a sorry figure as Finance Minister. And nothing has demonstrated this fact more than her utterances on the strike by the Academic Staff Union of Universities, ASUU.
To start with, she announced, as if it was true, that government cannot pay the N92 billioncausing the present palaver. She turned out to be wrong on three counts at least - none of which does her reputationas a global financial expert any good. It was poor defence and exposed her as someone who did not do her homework very well before commenting on a vital national issue.
First, as Dr Ajiboye pointed out, N92 billion represented a figment of the imagination of the former World Bank Managing Director. Ajiboye, a valid representative of all the ASUU creditors, told us that the amount due to them was N87 billion; not N92 billion. Even for a wasteful administration, overpaying by N5 billion would have been reprehensible. There is a lot of good work which government can do with N5 billion instead of throwing it away carelessly. Throwing public money away carelessly was what led to the fuel subsidy scam which tarnished her reputation in 2011/2012 when she jumped into the fray without checking her facts properly.
Second, her statement about government's inability to pay lacked credibility and was soon discredited by the President. There is a distinct difference between "can't pay" and"won't pay". The former admits of financial weakness or destitution; the latter connotes willful refusal to honour an agreement into which government voluntarily entered.
For the Minister of a government which allowedthe country to be defrauded of over N1 trillion to claim that government cannot pay N92 billion or less than one per cent, is an insult to the intelligence of Nigerians and discredit togovernment itself. As if toprove that the Minister spoke, not for government but herself, the President a few days after ordered that more than N92 billion be released to the universities. That order by Jonathan had elevatedOkonjo-Iweala's claim from the realm of the incredible to a colossal lie.Where will government find N100 billion to carry out the President's instructions if it cannot afford N92 billion?
But, all those pale by comparison with Dr Okonjo-Iweala's real contribution to this awful national calamity. Read Dr Ajiboye's assertions again and the astute reader can readily see the genesis of this whole mess. In January last year, long after the 2013 budget had been presented to the National Assembly, obviously with no provisions for paying the N87 billion owed to ASUU, the President, who at that time was facing a national revolt on accountof fuel price increase fromN65 per litre to N141 did not want another ASUU strike to add to the uprising. So, government,perhaps ill-advisedly andhastily promised ASUU N400 billion additional money; that brought the total debt payable in 2013to N487 billion.
Call it incompetence or lack of courage and/or integrity, but given a 2012 budget, from which any provisions for ASUU had been excluded, promising eleven per centof last year's budget to the academic staff of universities was fraudulent. When Jonathan Swift, 1667-1745, wrote that,"Promises, like pie-crusts, are made to be broken", (VANGUARD BOOK OF QUOTATIONS p203), he must have had a government like the present one in mind. It is one government on whose promises nobody should rely. So 2012 ended without government honouring itsagreements. That was bad enough.
Source: AllAfrica
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