In the minds of analysts, it is the result of past poor handling of Nigeria’s economy by policymakers who held the reins all through the past decade that has led to the problem the country now faces.

Although it seems that there is an awakening going on among officials seeing all the ruins, this sadly does not change the fact that Nigerians, right now, are faced with uncertainty and the question of where they might find their next meal.

Prof Kingsley Moghalu, a political economist thinks probing for an answer is most likely going to be their reality for the next five years.

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This thought came up on Tuesday 5 March at the Abuja-held Leadership Newspaper Group 2024 Conference and Awards where the former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Deputy Governor had been fixed to provide the keynote speech.

Although he might not have intended for such to happen, Prof Moghalu’s projection was grim. The gong of gloom and doom stemmed from the inevitable consequence of shabby monetary and fiscal policies that were left to run for too long over time.

The past 10 years were particularly ruinous. They were the years of the locust, marked by unprecedented mismanagement of fiscal policy, unproductive external borrowing, unnecessary budget deficits, illegal Ways & Means lending by the Central Bank of Nigeria to the federal government to the tune of N30tn, and unprecedented corruption.

Earlier, a combination of oil price shocks and an incompetent policy response from the CBN, in the form of an attempt to fix the exchange rate, all helped give us two recessions within seven years.

Many of these things happened because, as we witnessed, there was a successful political assault on the independence of the central bank, with the storekeeper willingly handing over the store keys to the marauders.

Since the administration of the new president, Bola Tinubu started last June, there has been an attempt at a reform that is largely going wrong. Hunger remains and people in Ogun, Kaduna and the F.C.T. have ransacked slowing trucks and unguarded warehouses in search of food, which shows a state of desperation that the federal government cannot fully grasp yet.

Attending the Leadership Newspaper conference was also the president, although not physically.

His Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris represented him and admitted that we are in challenging times, no doubt, but these times have also been marked by unprecedented opportunities, to reset course and to build a new and sustainable economy, away from the rent-seeking and the waste that was once the order of the day. But optimism currently is not cutting it for cash-strapped households dealing with hyperinflation.

Sensitising the populace before rushing petrol subsidy removal last May and about the floating of the Naira that happened the following month would have been a better deal, according to 60-year-old Prof Kingsley Moghalu who served at the CBN from 2009 to 2014. For him, it is time to look forward.

It is about a project, to be scoped and commissioned within the next three months, and one that ought to be predicated on massive investment in the development of railway lines (linking all state capitals), housing (mortgage-ready and qualitative to incrementally reduce housing deficits), and agriculture (covering the value chain), to be delivered in the first phase over three years beginning in 2024.

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