- How Nigeria suffers in the power play of a body it virtually funds
By Henry Chukwurah
RIGHT now, at the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), all is not well.
Addressing the first 2016 ordinary session of its parliament in Abuja last month, President of the ECOWAS Commission, Mr. Alain Marcel de Souza, alerted parliamentarians to the worsening financial state of the sub-regional body formed about 41 years ago, to accelerate growth and development.
Danger alert
A visibly worried Souza, who incidentally was making his first appearance since he became the commission’s president, told the gathering that dire paucity of funds induced mainly by poor compliance of member states to prompt remittance of the community levy, has rendered the organisation financially impotent and could lead to irregular payment of salaries. The levy represents about 90 per cent of the organisation’s funding.
He pointedly told the lawmakers: “To date, the financial situation of the community institutions is altogether worrying and could adversely affect the results of the whole of year 2016 if no substantial improvement is recorded.”
Waning credibility
Few weeks later, when he paid a courtesy visit to the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Hajia Khadijat Bukar Ibrahim, Souza told the minister that ECOWAS was losing its credibility due to overwhelming debt burden.
Although he fingered the current global economic downturn for failure of member states to pay up, it would appear that the ECOWAS helmsman momentarily forgot that Nigeria, which doles out about 65 per cent of the body’s funds each year, had in protest of ugly happenings in the commission, withheld its contributions from part of 2014 till this year. The contributions totalled $694,000. He also didn’t mention that Cape Verde, which enjoys equal rights and privileges with Nigeria, had not paid the mandatory levy for 10 years, but merely promised recently to tidy up her accounts within one year.
President Souza later told journalists after his meeting with Nigeria’s junior foreign affairs minister, that the country’s refusal to release the withheld funds was hurting dangerously and could snuff life out of the commission. He admitted that without Nigeria’s contributions, the commission would be unable to sustain its activities.
A sampler: the commission has been unable to fund its peace keeping efforts in crisis-ridden Guinea Bissau, forcing Nigeria to withdraw its troops due to unpaid allowances.
A lifeline from Nigeria
From all indications, it is obvious that Souza’s cry to President Muhammadu Buhari, shortly after his visit to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, softened the Federal Government’s heart a little and it promised to release part of the withheld funds. Although government has kept sealed lips over the exact amount doled out to cash-strapped ECOWAS, a source said it was enough to save it from threatening suffocation, while its new leadership is expected to embark on urgent surgical operation needed to keep it alive and vibrant once again.
The government was said to have insisted, however, that it would not increase its contributions until its conditions for attaining a better managed, transparently organized and truly representative organization were met. The government said it desired a commission committed to meeting the expectations of its founding fathers and indeed, the people of the sub-region. Before now, the Nigerian government, as Foreign Affairs Minister, Geoffrey Onyeama later confirmed, had made suggestions on how to reposition the organisation.
Parliamentarians tasked
The role played by Nigerian lawmakers in convincing the government to give a lifeline to the commission could not be ascertained before press time. But, it was gathered that so much efforts were put in before the president reviewed his earlier no- deal-until-you-meet-our-terms stand.
in his closing address, Speaker of ECOWAS Parliament, Moustapha Cisse Lo, had told his fellow lawmakers: “We cannot remain indifferent to these obstacles that threaten the survival of ECOWAS institutions. Therefore, as our contribution toward solving this problem, I solemnly appeal that right from now, we embark on strong lobbying with our respective governments on the need to respect the provisions of the protocol relating to the community levy.” Journey to poverty
Investigations revealed that the slide of ECOWAS to abject lack did not happen overnight. Until the bubble burst recently, successive leadership of the organization had thrown prudence to the wind, spending as if there would be no tomorrow and in faulty confidence that the well from which they drew would never run dry. None of the various affiliates of the organisation was free from the disregard for cautious spending. Instances abound where top officials turned meetings and sessions into a jamboree, where all forms of dubious claims were made and approved. Some officials, whose home countries’ economy were battling to stay afloat, saw their tenure in ECOWAS and serving in Nigeria as a golden opportunity to live big, even when the funds were coming from few other member states, with Nigeria hugely leading the pack.
For example, there is the credible story about a former president of the Commission who, on arrival in Nigeria, was offered a well-furnished duplex guesthouse in Abuja by the government. But he allegedly rejected the official residence of the chief executive because it was not befitting his status. Instead, he got the community to rent another building for millions of naira in Asokoro.
Also, in February 2012, the new management of the Commission, in utter disregard of an earlier decision of the organisation, had recommended an expansion without minding the cost implications. Perhaps, this explains why, for the first time in the history of the organization, a president appointed nine advisers, including his relations. During his tenure, ECOWAS became a ‘Father Christmas’ donating money to some member states for even elections and a failed power project.
About five years ago, a vice president of the commission attended an ECOWAS meeting outside Abuja in a chartered flight. Similarly, a few years ago, the commission approached the Nigerian government for a loan to build an estate for its professional cadre of workers at Katampe, a highbrow suburb for which a total of $20 million was released in two tranches. On completion of the estate, the workers refused the houses on the excuse that the rooms were not to their taste and that they were not consulted on the project. The rejected houses were later shared and sold to some top government officials of the immediate past administration and politicians as well as some senior ECOWAS officials, including foreigners. at ridiculously cheap prices. Sources at the commission and the Foreign Affairs Ministry stated that the loan was not repaid because the estate was rejected. Unofficial sources have also alleged that till date, Nigerian parliamentarians are usually paid estacode as if they travelled outside the country for attending meetings and other activities of the body in Abuja.
Nigeria as whipping boy
Nigeria’s much-touted choice of Africa as the centrepiece of its foreign policy has over the years, placed the country in so much disadvantage, to the detriment of the nation and Nigerians.
Many nations had benefitted from Nigeria in the past, especially in troubled times as was witnessed during the struggles for self-rule by the Southern African countries. But beyond the usual diplomatic tongue-in-cheek praises of the country by beneficiary countries in the continent, Nigeria has remained an avoidable victim of its well-intentioned goodness toward most African nations.