20 Aug 2009 |
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SECOND HALF (2009) STILL NO GOALS: A LOOK AT OUR MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOAL SCORE BOARD Being a keen soccer lover, a Manchester united at that, I will love to approach the millennium development goals from the point of view of the round leather game in mind. After all, it is still about scoring or achieving goals. Whenever I watch my team play and before half time, the team fails to score – which should serve as a moral booster into the second half - I become very jittery. This should prompt me and my fellow red devils to debate and analyze the strategy we failed to execute and what are our likely remedies. So actualizing the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is akin to a soccer game. In September 2000, representatives of 189 countries met in New York at the United Nations millennium summit. The result was a declaration to deliver a global compact between rich and poor nations that underscores basic human rights to all people. The MDGs in Nigeria comprises of 8 goals, 18 targets and 48 indicators. In a country like ours where the ministry of finance, planning commission, CBN ,the office on MDG among others spew out conflicting data and results, this is bound to leave people outside this country in total disarray. But thank goodness, in this mountain of confusion we the local people residing in any given locality in Nigeria where this projects are claimed to be sited refuse to be perplexed. It is heart breaking to note that the rural people of Akpabuyo local government area in cross river state where I domicile have heard little or nothing about the MDGs, apart from the war against the AIDS pandemic which has been on since. The government at every forum claim to support agriculture; however, the reality on ground says it all. Akpabuyo people are mostly farmers but due to the continuous existence of the land use act, they hardly have proper access to land for farming. In most villages huge acres of land lie dormant, unutilized and the little these poor people can lay hold on, they are being chased about from plot to plot. The mushroom clinics in the area cannot meet up with the ever-burgeoning population. Most pregnant women still patronize traditional mid-wifery homes and birth attendants due to lack of care from hospitals. Mortality rates are rampant because these homes are ill equipped to handle emergencies and complications and this gives room for HIV to thrive (not minding their spurious and politicized prevalence data). For education, a recent survey by a civil society group concluded that more children of school age are out of school due to grinding poverty more than ever. An avalanche of empirical studies show that there is a linkage between income and environment because a hungry man won’t give a hoot about his environment, to say we live like pigs is being euphemistic. Halving poverty by 2015 will require huge amount of money, to this end the UN fixed at least $10 million to meet the MDGs in African countries, as you read this our politicians cannot say categorically how much money we need and show the yearly milestones put in place to bring us out of this dung hole. Every year, federal budget appropriated for educational sector falls far below UNESCO benchmark of 26%. As far as budgeting and implementation is concerned, all tiers of government have failed. This made this writer conclude that Nigeria is a graveyard of policy documents. As at the end of 2008, billions of naira in unspent funds was returned to the treasury by MDAs. When budget implementation is less than 30%, it gives room for serious concern. No wonder why there is no a single federal project in my locality. To underscore our ineptitude in leadership, it seems our handlers are swimming more than ever in platitudes. In the Abacha years it used to be vision 20 20:20, but now if a cabinet minster commissions a borehole in a village, he will add the 7point agenda, NEEDs and rebranding chorus. All these portend bad news for the MDGs at the grassroots. How to Score Goals “Implementation is the nemesis of designers, it conjures up images of plans gone awry and of social carpenters and masons who fail to build to specifications and thereby distort the beautiful blueprints for progress which were handed to them. It provokes memories of good ideas that did not work.” – George Honadle (1979). Just as it is in the round leather game of soccer, when the attack is poor, goals are not scored and games will not be won. By attack here, the writer is referring to the implementation of budgets. Achieving the MDGs is about implementing budgets. A study conducted by UNDP showed that very little technical analysis went into the establishment of spending priorities. Implementation is the major problem confronting developing countries and not paucity of funds. A typical example of poor implementation made President Yar’Adua announce during the presentation of the 2008 budget to the national assembly, that no new capital expenditure projects will be undertaken in the new budget in order to complete that of previous year running behind schedule. Keeping back development money received from the treasury by MDAs should be seen as an economic crime. A good defensive strategy is very vital to a winning squad. The same should be done in pruning down unnecessary recurrent expenditures. With the current price of oil, we need to tighten our belts. Slashing over bloated political cabinets, pay packages and rechanneling funds to investment purposes in rural areas will be vital. An interventionist model of setting up small agro-cottage industries that will process farm produce will leapfrog goals 1 & 2, which have multiplier effect in uplifting families out of poverty. Government ought to address this by ensuring transparency in adopting international best practices in budgeting. This will further ensure the attainment of goal 8. Accountants could start by changing the way auditing is done from financial auditing of certifying payments and receipts to systems auditing and examining the whole concept of value for money. Otherwise, they will be certifying corruption. It is never too late to make big strides, I dream of a time when early passage of appropriation bill will be seen as a matter of national security, unlike what is currently obtainable where the bill is ‘dead on arrival’ because it was sent in late. Though we are in the second half way through to 2015, Nigeria can still turn things around before the blast of the whistle. Giftson Udoh
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