Opinion: 2015! Here comes the year…

Essentially, it offers the promise of fresh opportunities for individuals, groups and nations to take stock of the past for the purpose of reconciling same with the present, in order to condition the future. How such will play out shall be determined by factors such as natural order and human intervention; the latter through well intentioned planning, or the absence of such.
Yet nothing can diminish the landmark status of 2015, especially for Nigeria given the complement of events and situations that preceded it, and are envisaged to manifest during its course, particularly in the political terrain. Topical among these is the forthcoming general elections that are scheduled to hold so early in the year between February 14th and 28th. But for its prospects to change the leadership regime at the federal and state tiers of governance, the timing is ordinarily too early for some big men and women to have weaned themselves of the annual holiday fever. But this is politics in Nigeria – in which the more you look the less you may see; depending on circumstances.
It is said that whoever visits the commercial city of Aba in Abia State of Nigeria, and prances around while standing up arrogantly, will not understand the uncommon goodies it offers. However, if the same person stoops down to study the city carefully, then he or she will appreciate where the billions of naira that are for the picking, and which make Aba a Mecca for the informal sector prospectors, are located. That of course comes with the price of not minding the outrage of serial abandonment of the city by several administrations, ranging from local governments councils that have proven clueless over simple waste disposal, to the state administrations that only excel in governance by chicanery and propaganda.
Expectedly Nigerians look forward to the unfolding of 2015 with justified concern, at least over the build-up to the year. For instance, even before the elections come up, the nation’s economy had received a shock when the international price of oil – Nigeria’s main foreign exchange earner – crashed from around $100 per barrel in July to about $57.00, in a matter of months.
This dispensation wiped out at least 30% of the country’s revenue earnings for the period. Some fall-outs of the dispensation comprise the disarray in the revenue sharing exercise by the tiers of government, as well as the inability of several federal government agencies and states to pay workers’ salaries, for months running.
 In response to the oil price fall, the government launched a complement of austerity measures under the subtle cover of toned down rhetorics. These preliminary measures shall invariably be followed by more stringent belt-tightening steps as 2015 progresses, given a proper reading of the Nigerian situation.
To the Nigerian at street level however, the dispensation serves as a wake-up call that 2015 will not be business as usual. This message has also been delivered in clear terms by President Goodluck Jonathan himself at several fora, during which he called for understanding by the citizens with the government.
For an economy that had not enjoyed the best expedients of global best fit management practice, the development is hardly surprising given the lamentable, traditional mindset of ‘waste now, justify later,’ which is often seen to  drive some fiscal considerations in the country, even before the advent of the present administration. There is an African saying which condemns a person who watches a kite pick up a tortoise in captivity, for dinner. How did the killer bird penetrate the hard shell of the reptile without challenge by the apparently bemused spectator?
How was it that with the avalanche of available empirical information on the global oil business, the nation’s economic managers failed to provide effective buffer to counter the impact of the oil price induced crisis. This is especially so given that the development was foreseen, and triggered serial campaigns by well-meaning Nigerians, for diversifying the economy and plugging areas of waste, particularly through widespread corruption.
The recent warning to government by the Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN) over the fear of job cuts is instructive. According to them, government has no justification to visit sins of poor management of the economy on innocent civil servants. Given the strategic role of its membership in the life of any administration its stand qualifies to be taken seriously and remains indicative of the general response by the wider society to belt tightening measures.
Yet government initiative on austerity has to succeed in order to move the country forward. This it can achieve by ensuring that its measures are seen to be sincere and far from parochial. Nigerians are waiting for the President to take action at the top, especially with respect to pruning waste from otherwise untouchable corners of its structure. For instance the strategy teams of the Presidency and by implication the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is led by an officer with a compromised health status. The Special Adviser to the President on Research, Documentation and Strategy Mr. Oronto Douglas has been spending three weeks every month, in a foreign hospital for the past three years at an average cost estimated by medical experts to be over N6 million monthly.  
Even if the contributions of such an officer had been invaluable in the past, the inviolable power of time, to change everything when due, cannot be overemphasized. Needless to point out that given his present state of diminished capacity to perform, the best to come from him is through delegation of critical functions to secondary aides; a process which exposes his principal to unverified elements in the protocol chain, and  whose loyalties as well as competencies cannot be guaranteed. The system can do better with Oronto’s replacement, along with any other whose status is incompatible with current imperatives.
Oronto’s case reminds of the story about the invention of the decanter, which has saved many alcoholics and others from disaster.  As the story goes, there was an emperor that had a beloved general who recorded success after success in military campaigns. The emperor soon discovered that the general’s contributions during discussions were sterling, until the latter became overwhelmed by effect of uncontrolled intake of alcohol, offered him in the palace. A smart gold smith solved the problem by developing a decanter for the emperor, to manage his guest better.
Yet all that 2015 has to offer are not tales of woe. Since beside every stormy cloud is found a silver lining, so is it with the year.  Let us therefore get on with discovering in fuller measure, all that this iconic year, 2015 has to offer.