Christmas is hours away, a fact that should make hearts giddy with joy. But in Tinubu’s Nigeria it’s tribulation time.
For Nigerian Christians—and even many non-Christians—Christmas is the grandest, most colorful celebration on the calendar. It’s a time to relish a smorgasbord of delicious food, quaff beer, wine, and spirits to excess, look our sartorial best, and have rollicking fun with family, friends, and acquaintances. It’s also a feast that activates a generous spirit, moving those with means to extend a helping hand to their less fortunate neighbors and relatives.
Not this year, from all accounts.
For some reason, Nigeria is in the middle of a terrible cash crunch. A few days ago, I had a disquieting conversation a relative of mine. The distraught relative reached for a metaphor to describe the dire situation. The naira note, he said, has become as scarce as rainfall in the thick of the dry season.
For years, this guy would dole out cash to some of the poor in his community during the yuletide. The money was to enable the beneficiaries to buy food and a few other presents for Christmas. He fully intended to practice his philanthropy this year. Alas, he’s faced an intractable obstacle: he can’t get access to the cash he has in any bank.
“Sometimes all you can get from a bank is two thousand naira,” he told me. “It’s a good day when they give you up to five thousand. These days, to get more than ten thousand naira in cash, you need to know some big shot in a bank.”
The root of the crisis lies in public uncertainty about the status of a decision by former President Muhammadu Buhari to redesign the naira. Earlier this year, the wretched implementation of that policy created a devastating shortage of currency. Reports abounded of bank customers bribing bankers to receive even a small bundle of the redesigned naira. Many desperate Nigerians paid usurious commissions to streetside cash providers popularly known as point of sale (POS).
The impact of the cash drought was widely felt, but imposed a particular burden on the country’s poor.
The whisper was that the Buhari administration sought to use the currency redesign to checkmate politicians who had stashed up war chests of billions of naira to buy anything from the presidency to local government seats. If that was the goal, it was both well intentioned but disastrous in execution.
In March, Nigeria’s Supreme Court weighed in on the matter. In a unanimous verdict, the court overruled the Buhari administration’s plan to eliminate the old design of the naira as legal tender. Instead, the court ruled that both designs of the currency should be in use till December 31, 2023. Slowly, that judicial intervention marked the beginning of the end of that first cash shortage. The extra time for the old notes became a lifesaver.
But with the terminal date set by the court in sight, Nigerians panicked. Apparently, people and businesses began to hoard cash. With little cash in their vaults, banks resorted to rationing payouts.
Ultimately, as the current cash squeeze worsened, the Tinubu administration asked the apex court to rule that the two designs of the naira should circulate legally until further notice. About three weeks ago, the court granted that petition.
Unfortunately, the resolution came a tad too late to spare the most impoverished Nigerians the now certain fate of a gloomy Christmas.
Like many crises in Nigeria, this one was both human-made and avoidable. The government should have pursued the case with the alacrity it deserved. It should have assured Nigerians, months earlier, that it was going to plead with the court to okay an indefinite extension of the old notes.
As it turned out, the poor must bear the brunt of the ruling elite’s delinquencies. A period that’s associated with cheer and gaiety is bound to spell doom for the same set of Nigerians who never get a break.
The relative who spoke to me gave a portrait of the near hopelessness of the situation. He said those who most depend on his largesse are so poor they have no bank accounts. That rules out the option of electronic transfer of funds to them. “These are people who really must receive cash, or nothing,” the thwarted benefactor explained.
To grasp this predicament at scale, consider this: the price of a bag of rice—a staple of Nigerian cuisine—now retails around N60,000. That’s twice the country’s minimum wage! Many families don’t have the means to purchase rice. Now, with banks unable to give more than two or three thousand naira to each customer, the usual suppliers of succor to many a destitute Nigerian are incapacitated.
It all translates to a Christmas in which many stomachs will be empty. Those who run, and ruin, Nigeria are notoriously unimaginative and unconscionable. By their actions and words, they mock those whose lives they upend. Ensconced in their legislative chambers, they pass vapid resolutions about “letting the poor breathe,” then smirk as they splurge on new cars and other luxuries.
The year 2023 has been nightmarish for Nigerians. It began with extreme suffering caused by the disappearance of the naira. Now, as the year draws to a close, it’s déjà vu! Both times, the crisis was precipitated by mindlessness by those in authority.
I wonder if these mis-rulers have a smattering of sober colleagues in their ranks, to remind them occasionally, that cruelty—sooner or later—begets resistance. And that there’s bound to be a saturation point to the poor’s seemingly elastic capacity for suffering in silence.