63% of Nigeria’s poor global rankings necessitate the use of recovered loot for developmental projects

Credit: Global Competitiveness Index 2015-2018, Infoprations Analysis 2018

As the recovery of public funds plundered by politicians and individuals continues in Nigeria, Infoprations’ analysis has shown that 63% of the country’s poor ranking in quality of overall infrastructure, quality of electricity supply, government debt to Gross Domestic Product, health, quality of education and security necessitate the use of looted funds for developmental projects across the country.

Infoprations mined and analysed Nigerians’ views on the recent Federal government’s intent to disburse the recovered 322 million dollars Abacha loot through Conditional Cash Transfers (CCT) to 302,000 poor households in 19 states.  Analysis indicates that Nigerians want the recovered fund to be used for electricity generation, building and revamping moribund industries especially steel plants.

Infoprations equally discovered that Nigerians want administration of President Muhammadu Buhari to use the loot to upgrade healthcare facilities and constructing new hospitals across the country in addition to job creation, improved education, workers' welfare and citizen's standard of living.

“To those in authority, this money should not be shared to anybody being poor or rich; it should be used to revamp all the steel plants across the country. These steel plants will greatly reduce the rate of unemployment if they are put into production and this will be the beginning of development in the country. Sharing will not bring any impact to anybody. Don't give people fish, but teach them how to fish. The indirect employment from the steel industries is better than the direct employment,” Immanuel Ogobene noted.

Olanrewaju Olamercy Agoro believes that transferring money to the poor would not have significant impact on them. According to him, the idea would worse their situation and takes them back to poverty level. “This won’t have positive long term impact on poverty reduction in the country,” he stressed.

Analysis further reveals that Nigeria should have been better in the ranking of quality of overall infrastructure, electricity supply, education, government debt to Gross Domestic Product, health, and security between 2015 and 2017 if looted funds have been used to address the areas identified. Appropriation of looted funds for the developmental projects suggests 6.1%, 23.7% and 20.9% reduction in the poor global rankings for 2015, 2016 and 2017 respectively. 

For 2018, analysis shows that the rankings should have been reduced by 25%. These insights indicate that Nigerian government needs to reconsider its CCT programme and use recovered loot for projects that would benefit every Nigerian.