 Welcome back to the breakfast on plus TV Africa now Let's go back a little while ago in history to the year 2014 and the story I'm sharing this morning is something that you may have heard a lot of times on this day, of course that there were Claims of about 58 billion Naira that was traced to numerous accounts of or Nigerian government money That was traced to numerous accounts across the country that the government of course at that time said, you know They were going to you know retrieve and you know, put back into the economy It was on this day the Ministry of Finance announced that it had traced about 58 billion on remitted Revenue of the federal government to various bank accounts. It said the funds were hidden by unscrupulous bank managers and collaborators and ministries departments and agencies Back then the coordinating Minister for the economy and Minister of Finance, Dr Ungozio Conjewela and Abuja Threatened heavy sanctions including closure of such accounts Against the corporates by of course the next week if all of such monies were not paid into the Consolidated revenue fund of the federal government She said in a statement that the practice through which government officials place government revenue in their illegal accounts To earn interest for their pockets was unacceptable and must be stopped Starting of course on 17th of June the office of the accountant general of Federation in of course exercise of its powers You know threatened that it will close those bank accounts of the agencies involved in this practice in all banks across the country at that time, so 58 billion, you know as it was declared was found missing if you remember a couple of years later in 2017 There was the eco e-gate Where about 13 billion naira was found of course in naira and in dollars heroes pounds any currency You can imagine was found in an apartment somewhere in eco e That's just some another example and Not very long ago. I'm not sure what year this was but there was a conversation by Abdullah she made now It was on a phone call with this guy who was The radio guy who was slapping people Yes, left and right. He did it just once as much as we know all that so In the conversation with him, you know on on on that radio show Abdul Rashid may not had claimed that, you know, if the government would just let him You know come back into the country and or he wasn't contracted it then Oh, if it land younger men will let him, you know He would prove that he didn't steal any money and it would also show where, you know Accounts across the country where there's billions and billions of naira That have you know continued to approve, you know over years That their government funds, you know that people create these false bank accounts and you know continues to start billions of naira every year The money continues to generate interest And it hasn't happened for many many years that he's aware of So there's been multiple of these type of claims, you know here and there But of course the question, you know, Landryans have continued to ask is, you know, have these funds been retrieved What have they been used for even after being retrieved the EFCC chairman for my EFCC chairman, you know Made claims about billions of naira. So that had been retrieved, you know by the current administration, you know in the last couple of years, but Once again, you know where all these funds that the Ungoze konje well at that time You know what she's successful in retrieving that 58 billion if yes, then, you know, what was the money eventually used for? Many times I always talk about the the auditor general of federation and how we have very very poor auditing with a lot of money That goes through our system here in Nigeria on the federal level and on the state level There's almost zero auditing, you know And you will never be able to really really vowed for any of these MDAs or any of these, you know Government agencies and say, okay. Yes, every single penny that got, you know, sent to them was properly utilized and These are the excesses or these are, you know, the, you know, whatever it is That is the balance of the amount of money that was allocated to them You just hear that a hundred billion was given to this agency and that's it, you know, that it's a wrap, you know So it's a place that we need to do better But on this day in 2014 58 billion I was declared to have been traced to unscrupulous bank accounts across the country You see, I find it very hard to wrap my head around the fact that Millions and big millions Billions of Naira has been stolen Almost every day by politicians They're super rich, super wealthy, yet they steal public funds and On the other side of the coin you find the poorest of the poor in Nigeria. So how do we just oppose? Corruption stealing of public funds in their billions Yeah, and then poverty. It's it's it's um So it is the the It's the it's what you get when you have Very very poor institutions and very poor processes. So when you have those institutions There's avenues for leakage of government funds here and there From every agency that you can imagine even jam That should really just be second exams There's avenues through which billions of Naira for for for question papers to print question paper Billions of Naira to buy pencil everywhere custom to buy eraser even on the state level There's a friend of mine who did you know, auditing for a particular state in the south with some time ago And just was sharing how much billions keep getting missing every day and the stupid part is whenever a governor decides Okay, I'm gonna change the processes through which we get in government forms I remove all these touts on the streets who are basically just stealing money from the government Eventually is kicked out because the people say that he's taking food from them out But that's you know, that's the Nigerian story and it hasn't changed. Let's not do so Really when we talk about Nigeria running into debts, you know And and things like this I really ask myself if we can actually check those processes by which money is stolen in Nigeria Would we still have this problem? No, very likely not who would be able to save billions and billions and billions every year If if we simply had better institutions and better processes Through which money was made and you know spent but we don't sadly Still about the economy on this day in history June 14 2012 Nigeria's a conjo where that she she she put out a warning She was a former a minister of finance. She was also co-ordinating minister for the economy Dr. Goseo Conjuella She warned that there was a difficult time ahead for Nigeria And she was saying this to the federal executive council during the meeting in Abuja Asking the government to buckle up and prepare for a possible recession in the economy She gave this warning and this was coming on the heels of a new visa regime by the federal government This new visa regime stipulated that Foreigners would come into the country without you know needing to go through all those visa processes Come into the country and get visa on arrival See need to open up investment opportunities And they would try for it not to jeopardize our national security here and there So she just went on to talk about the dire economic situation that Nigeria was facing And that we needed to buckle up and prepare for a possible recession So this was what happened. She talked about the weakness The signs of weaknesses in the Nigerian economy talked about unemployment the lack of tourism You know terrorism she just mentioned all these challenges at that meeting on this day in history You know the federal executive council telling them about the possibility that Nigeria was going to get into recession And uh true to her words we did see that recession even though it wasn't immediate We saw a recession in 2016. We saw another one in 2020 And we know that um, this is basically because of falling critical prices still lending voice and cause To the cause for Nigeria to move our economy from a mono economic Situation of you know, heavy dependence and reliance on oil to a diverse economy, you know, looking into agriculture telecoms, you know Tourism and so many other parts of our economy. So it was in this same history That a country where I put out this morning crazy how she's she features in these two You know stories I was hearing this morning from 2012 and also 2014, you know, and You know, she was also praised, you know, because of these statements that she made back then You know, and then there's also people who criticize the government back then, you know for not doing enough to Prevent us from getting into, you know, recession, which eventually we got into later, you know After they had left, you know office. She currently of course has a world trade organization There has been for the longest time Conversations about diversifying our economy and moving us away from just, you know, over reliance on oil, you know Getting into agriculture and that's one of the things that the current administration had Spoken a lot about and promised that we're going to be able to achieve, you know, when they come came to power You know in 2015, but we don't seem to have done very well with regards that, you know And, you know, we're still very very heavily dependent on oil Um, the agricultural sector that, you know, many have said that we should move into has not done It doesn't seem to have done very well And also how much attention have we placed into actually funding agriculture and ensuring that farmers can go to the farms, you know And, you know, you know, removing the security, you know, challenge that has also affected our agricultural Growth in the last couple of years with we've not in my opinion. We've not done very very well We've actually done very very poorly and we still are very very reliant on oil That we're not sure how much longer we will survive, but Hopefully you at some point we actually get to experience this talk of diversifying our economy Yes, when the right people come into power like technocrats people who truly have a vision for what the country should look like And that's why, you know, people look at things like this and they say they're going to be out in the street to talk about the vision that MQA Biola had for Nigeria if you remember the campaign promises of 1993 It's it's it's almost as though he was campaigning for president in 2020 in 2021 Because we still have those challenges still have challenges of power. No lights. No food. No water No, you know talked about how people are earning so little and yet it's transportation that gops The bulk of their salary ask any Nigerian youth, you know, the early 20s, you know And above they tell you that the bulk of the transportation the bulk of their salary goes into transportation So there's challenges of those there. He says hope 93, you know, it's just it's just a lot. It's just a lot We need we need something we need we need new sets of leaders come to in 2023 people who would look at the country And you know be able to bring the vision that they have for the country into fruition And even if it's not agriculture, you know, how well have we done with you know information technology? Exactly how well have we done with you know science and technology generally, you know in the last couple of years Really, I don't know what we've really really done, you know with regards diversifying our economy We currently have conversations about a ban on twitter We're currently of course, I'm you know conversations and it seems like the government is not very very keen on You know science and technology and it and you know and and that's where the revolution is That's where the industrial revolution begins. You know, but anyway, um, that's what happened today in history Okunjewela 2012 and gave a warning at the federal Economy council telling the Nigerian government to buckle up for a possible recession And of course in 2014 once again Okunjewela, stay with us our first major conversation this morning. It's talking about protesting a few days ago We of course had another You know a chaotic scene across states in Nigeria And we're going to have a discussion this morning on the rights to protest and the process really of protesting here in Nigeria We'll get into that right after the short break