Economist and Financial Affairs Activist, Dr. Boniface Chizea has warned that mismanagement and lack of organisation could deepen economic challenges even as opportunities emerge from recent international developments.

In an interview with ARISE NEWS on Sunday, Chizea discussed the multifaceted impact of rising oil prices, global tensions, and Nigeria’s recent state visit to the United Kingdom on the country’s economy, outlining the immediate challenges Nigerians face, the government’s management of revenues, and broader geopolitical considerations.

“Well, I think the first thing to say is that really we shouldn’t be here where we are now.

It’s unfortunate. War is not the answer. It’s not the answer, What is happening now is a crisis for children. If you hit Iran, who’s just going to give you some crisis? In the world, what’s happened?

You have the state of Hormuz where about 20% of the world’s supply goes through that channel. Then it drops channels. It’s vulnerable.

So Iran goes and then knows what to do. It puts us under pressure. It puts every other person under pressure.”

On the impact of rising oil prices on Nigerians, he said, “Once you have some challenges, automatically, it reflects in the pump price. That’s exactly what we are seeing.

Once you touch the pump price of oil, Israel is almost out of control. It attacks everything.

What’s happening is that the transporters, the buses, the farmers, they feel it. Even us at home. I’m crying now. The amount of money I spend on diesel. So in terms of band A and so on, power supply, we know what it is.

I spend on average 40,000 in three days. Just diesel. I have solar. I have a big generator. You’re not in band A. So that crisis comes across.”

He criticised Nigeria’s organisational inefficiencies and lack of fiscal discipline. “Nigeria is an oil producing country. Ideally, we should not feel the effect immediately the way we are feeling it now.

We are feeling it now because we are not organised, if we are organised and we have the funding capacity to this extent, 250,000 barrels a day, here, we shouldn’t.”

Addressing government revenue during this crude oil windfall, Chizea, “First of all, let’s say that let me start from where you took off. The point is that yes, there’s an increase. And this increase is government governance. It should not be run that way. You get money. You’re supposed to operate based on the blueprint. You’re supposed to operate. You have a budget. You put in places that are approved, and you’re supposed to implement that budget. Of course, we know here, we are notorious for not keeping fidelity in what we say we’re going to do in our budget. We should have a budget.”

He warned of potential mismanagement of surplus funds. “So yes, obviously we earn some money but I can tell you maybe I start to be contradicted. I don’t know if anybody in government now knows how much excess we have. Maybe the guy that sits on the account of who should know, by the way.

Everybody knows where you have where things are done properly. You can’t touch one litre of fuel without somebody paying it up electronically. As this is happening, automatically, it should be real time we should be able to say today we’ve earned this extra. I’m sure that’s not to be corrected but I’m surprised if that is the case. That’s the challenge.”

Chizea also contextualised Nigeria’s foreign exchange gains in the global oil market, saying, “Very interestingly now because of what happened in Venezuela, what we’re seeing in Cuba now with Iran. With America now lifting sanctions so that they’ll be able to purchase or sell 140 million barrels I believe of Iranian oil. In the middle of a war now America is buying Iranian oil.”

He discussed the strategic significance of the UK visit and Nigeria’s infrastructure projects, “I think it’s win-win. They can come and furnish a port, a deposit, a loan, yes they will do it like my friend Wale did say self-financing self-financing.

What we want to say is that we expect that money is not going to be released. I don’t know how that’s going to work. I don’t know how to do it but I have to manage it properly because if you don’t manage it properly this money will be released and the job will not be done.

And then of course from what I read in the papers I don’t have any facts from what I’ve read, Most of the people will be hijacked and you might find work that is done that is not a job that would stand the test of time. Those are challenges when it comes to governance.”

Chizea also praised Asaba’s monarchy for engaging with corporate Nigeria. “We had a conversation with corporate Nigeria. That is what we counted. So we have Asaba we are very proud of Asaba we are very proud of we don’t have this as kind there are not many in Nigeria I say this I have been around not because of Asaba but I know that Asaba is unique he has very unique things and he wants to do things differently and so he wants to have a conversation with corporate Nigeria.

This monarchy being who he is he wouldn’t sit down and they just want to set up committees. I headed the committee on the economy so all these committees looked at various sectors of the economy including culture, tradition and so on and so forth and asked and each committee came up with ideas. They looked at the scene they did SWOT analysis and came up with project ideas and we had a summit in December I was a news speaker in that summit the ideas were floating and so we said we can’t do all this they come up with all these ideas and they leave it on the shelf he wants to come and talk to I talk about issues of demarcation of authority but I said to them the guy is having somebody of his stature who has clout he can influence many things he’s going to Abuja he’s influencing Sunda by power coming to Asaba he’s doing so many things he’s influencing people to come and do things in Asaba he’s in the same spirit but we must not forget the fact that he also wants to be on record that he’s the first monarch in recent memory to be doing this fantastic idea.” (AriseNews TV)

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