Sometimes, there simply isn’t an answer to the questions we ask. Sometimes, all we get, is a paradox.
Every Nigerian has at some point heard the repeated tale of how there aren’t any jobs available and we have to be creative. “Entrepreneurship is the key to the door of success”. This is drilled into us and you undoubtedly now either are, or know someone who’s an entrepreneur, or perhaps you’re still considering becoming one.
You’d think with all the effort put into convincing us to venture away from conventional white collar employment, the Nigerian government would have policies and systems in place to aid such ventures, but time and again, these people incharge of running our country show us just how detached they are from reality.
Last year, Uber drivers had to pay exorbitant, extortive amounts for a license to operate, despite the taxi platform itself being a registered tax paying entity, then it was Gokada’s turn to be scrapped, despite again it being registered and granted permission to operate by the Lagos state government, millions in investment, simply cast away with the flick of the wrist and now we have NIPOST’s new policy that’ll require logistics companies(i.e it’s competitors) to obtain licenses from NIPOST at what are simply exploitative and potentially business crippling fees for a lot of these smaller interstate, bike based companies. Policy makers do not seem to understand that these laws affect real life people or perhaps they do understand and simply do not care.
If you’re interested in the details of NIPOST’s new policy, see the image below
Like I said earlier, they’re detached from reality, the people making laws that stiffle public transport and small logistics companies have probably never even used them.
The NIPOST example is particularly infuriating because these small logistics companies with dispatch riders exist solely due to NIPOST’s own inefficiency, a fact You’re no doubt privy to if you’ve ever been unlucky enough to use their services.
So why is Nigeria run this way? Why does our government fold it’s arms, look away, offer us nothing but tell us to Innovate, to create, to be entrepreneurs and then turn around and slap down everything people sweat to create with its thoughtless policies? That’s the paradox!
“Nigerian youths are lazy”, this statement is even more infuriating when you consider the fact that virtually every ordinary Nigerian that has anything, did it entirely by themselves. The country forces you to be independent, to swim against the tide, like soldiers in the wilderness, we’re forced to provide for ourselves, electricity, water, waste management, EVERYTHING! While simultaneously fighting against corrupt institutions, brutally abusive security forces, gluttonous inflation and a currency that appears to be anorexic in foreign exchange rates.
Paradoxical! The only word fit to describe the enigma that is the Nigerian government’s SME (Small and Medium Enterprises) policies, and well, Economic policies in general. There is no one-size-fits-all technique to run an economy, any first year economist student can tell you this, yet we continuously attempt to copy and paste proven systems from completely different countries to our own and then act shocked when it fails.
I almost forgot to mention the chatter about the 6% charge on rent that’ll be implemented as well, we cannot tax like Britain, while simultaneously only providing the equivalent of a small isolated Amazon forest tribe. If I know this, then it’s safe to assume our leaders do as well, so then why do they do it? Again, That’s the paradox, but then, it’s only a paradox because we’re choosing to believe these people have our best interests at heart. The equation is easily solved if we consider the very real possibility that they they do know and they just don’t care.
I can almost guarantee you’d get more logical and fair answers in a university examination hall if you ask students how’d they’d handle this and what policies they’d implement.
What’s seemingly worse is that the people incharge of implementing such policies, like the minister/ministry are at this time denying knowledge of it, so if no one approved or even knows about it, how does it exist?
Yet another paradox.
This is a rant, like most other Nigerians, I am annoyed and appalled at how this country is run, there are so many things that are simply indefensible but those are articles for other days.
P.S. This is not a news blog, I simply write about my thoughts on these things so I do not have links that touch the things I skip, however, future articles will be fully exhaustive of all sides of the story, with links and images to ensure complete understanding.
If you’d like to do something about this, click the button below to sign a change.org petition to stop the policy.
SoToday 