The Obasanjo Scorecard

Part 4-International Relations, People and Corruption

We close our evaluation of President Obasanjo’s eight-year tenure with a look at his performance in International Relations, in impacting on the lives of the ordinary Nigerian and his efforts on reducing corruption, which in this column’s view is today Nigeria’s most serious economic, political and social problem. In International Relations, the nation’s challenges in 1999 were returning Nigeria to the comity of nations, securing international economic support and investment in Nigeria, addressing Nigeria’s foreign debt, engaging positively with the Nigerian Diaspora and improving the Nations international image.

If this evaluation were being made in 2006-two years to the end of Obasanjo’s tenure, we would without hesitation award him a distinction! He succeeded in re-integrating Nigeria into the international community, serving as ECOWAS, African Union (AU) and Commonwealth Chairman. He along with Mbeki became constant fixtures at G8 meetings and became the driving force and acceptable face of NEPAD (the New Partnership for African Development) and leader of its peer review mechanism, he inspired the creation of NIDO-Nigerian in Diaspora Organisation-and by the end of the regime, Nigeria was virtually debt-free, having secured unprecedented debt write-off from the Paris Club and some concessions from the London Club as well. The levels of foreign investment in non-oil sector rose significantly in IT and telecommunications, FMCG and other areas.

The regime got Nigeria de-listed from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) black list, got Nigeria BB- ratings from both Standard and Poors and Fitch and foreign lines of credit became readily available for Nigerian banks and institutions. In the last two years of his reign however, Obasanjo by his own hand down graded himself. The desire for constitutional amendment and tenure elongation, the exit of Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the messy feud with his Vice President and the PTDF revelations, the shameful elections in 2007 and the relaxation of fiscal transparency and prudence all smeared Nigeria’s international image. Fortunately however, many of the earlier achievements are probably irreversible in their impact, and Obasanjo will still earn a B+ for his performance in international relations.

President Obasanjo’s weakest performance in eight years is probably in terms of his impact on the average Nigeria. In setting the evaluation criteria, we stated in Part 1 of this series that “in looking at how the Obasanjo government affected people, we will consider factors such as living standards, (un)employment, education, health, rural development, housing, life expectancy, and security of lives and property. The critical issue of poverty alleviation and creation of a viable middle class will also be discussed under this head.” The regime left no tangible impact on any of these areas. The only index on which living standards improved was access to telephones. Otherwise quality of life deteriorated for most Nigerians. Life expectancy, health, education and other social services, security of life and property, rural squalor, urban infrastructural decay, housing and unemployment all worsened under Obasanjo. The government concentrated on macro-economic reforms and ignored the social sector. The “Empowering the People” leg of NEEDS was largely ignored and the objective of creating 10 million jobs has clearly failed, while the government concentrated on “Promoting Private Enterprise”-a dangerous strategy in a nation racked by poverty and wealth disparities. The Niger Delta became a virtual war zone reflecting the poverty and neglect of the region and the failure of the NDDC (as well as the regional governments). The government earns an E grade for its impact on people, but unfortunately does not get to re-sit this examination!

Finally, the Obasanjo regime had a critical imperative to “fight corruption” as indeed the former president promised. The regime’s actual record in this respect is however mixed. On the positive side, the regime established an institutional framework for tackling corruption-by pushing the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) Act through parliament early in its life and establishing the ICPC and the EFCC. The regime laid some precedents which might be useful in future-convicting a former Inspector-General of Police-Tafa Balogun and putting Ministers, a former Senate President and other top officials on trial for corrupt practices. The government appointed a professional Director-General in charge of Budget in the Ministry of Finance, established the BMPIU otherwise known as “due process” office and practiced budgetary transparency and prudence. The Fiscal Responsibility Act has been passed to institutionalise budgetary transparency.

However if one were to ignore the posturing and lofty proclamations about fighting corruption and examine the actual levels of corruption under Obasanjo, the picture gets less flattering to the regime. The question is, “were ministers, specials advisers and other public servants under Obasanjo less corrupt than their predecessors?” I do not think so! The opaque and secretive nature of the handling of NNPC and oil sector transactions and significant concerns about “value for money” in the power, works, transportation and other sectors called to question the regime’s real attitude to corrupt practices. There is evidence that the regime exhibited a curious dichotomy in its reaction to corrupt practices by its friends and its foes. When a Senate President (Anyim for instance) is friendly to the regime, he rapidly becomes rich, but once he falls out with the regime, the corruption searchlight is beamed on him. Once in a while of course, the regime was prepared to sacrifice some of its friends, but the tactical motive appeared to be pleasing an international audience rather than a commitment to fighting corruption. The regime does no better than a D grade in its anti-corruption record, and that is due only to the institutional frameworks and precedents it established.

Conclusion

This review shows that Obasanjo’s balanced scorecard is mixed-his strongest performance being on economy and international relations, a bare pass in anti-corruption efforts and outright failures in the regimes impact on ordinary Nigerians and on our country’s political and constitutional development. Generally the regime deteriorated in the last year of its tenure and sacrificed a large part of its legacy for temporal considerations. In our scoring grade, the regime’s overall performance attracts a grade lying between a C and D, but perhaps closer to the C. It could have been much better.