Owing largely to the abysmal failure of democratic political culture to rapidly improve the welfare of man and society especially in Africa, many have come to hate or distrust politicians with passion. A larger part of the African society, now frame politicians as unreliable. Citizens now see politicians as a bunch of unpatriotic, selfish, greedy, and corrupt people. It is mainly for this reason that political leaders who are desirous of writing their names in gold invite tested technocrats to help manage critical sectors of state machinery. Unfortunately however, these technocrats have most times ended up performing far worse than politicians do. One general excuse they usually give for their appalling failure is lack of free hands to operate. To be fair to political leaders that do not give these co-opted technocrats blank cheques to operate; most of them go into government without the slightest understanding of the workings and foundational essence of democratic governance. They forget that political leadership is far different from the conventional leadership culture. While the later is largely influenced by Naira and Kobo (urge to make profit), political leadership seeks to meet the diverse needs of the governed. Sometimes, this fundamental goal of democratic governance is achieved with state accounts in the red. It is in recognition of this fact that the concept of Foreign Reserves and Sovereign Wealth Fund became popular in many advanced democracies. The idea was to ensure that commercial concerns do not in any way deny citizens the good things of life. After all, democracy is all about the people. It is not enough to flaunt tittles and labels as most of our professionals do. For a country like Nigeria where a greater percentage of her citizens are living below poverty line, common sense should tell us that our economic experts and fiscal policy formulators will need to be very creative to be able to design practicable fiscal templates that can effectively fight poverty. Somehow, the colourful debate that followed the federal government's decision to stop paying subsidy on imported petrol has brought to the fore one very sad fact: Our nation's economic experts and fiscal policy formulators are overpaid. This is because their output is far below what is expected of them. Apart from their being apathetic, they are clearly drained of practicable ideas to stimulate rapid socio-economic growth. What they do is to sit in front of internet-ready computers and copy the fiscal policies of developed countries. In doing this, they fail to realize that a lot variables such as population, technology, culture, literacy level, unemployment rate, and even religion influences the design and mode of deployment of fiscal policies. The truth is that a fiscal policy that is successful in Europe may not necessarily do well in Africa owing to several factors as enumerated above. Every country is therefore expected to study her peculiar situation and circumstances before designing appropriate fiscal policies to match.The decision by the federal government to withdraw fuel subsidy is one of the fiscal policies erroneously copied from some developed countries. We must however not forget the fact that in those countries, the purchasing powers of citizens are strong enough to take care of their basic needs such as shelter, food, transport, health care, education, and socials. It is also necessary to point out that in the countries where our anti-subsidy apostles are drawing inspiration from, poverty level is clearly within the limits of a single digit. More than that, unemployment figures are tolerable and their public infrastructures are in excellent condition.One question that readily comes to mind is: how much percentage of Nigerian workers are able to take care of the basic needs of their families from their legitimate income' Going by the statement of the governor of Nigeria's Central Bank, Lamido Sanusi; only about 30% of Nigerians can take care of the basic needs of their families. What then happens to the remaining 70%' Your guess is as good as mine. Like I have, and will continue to insist, President Goodluck Jonathan means well for Nigeria. Unfortunately, just as George Bush was stampeded by faulty intelligence report to invade Iraq in 2003; overzealous anti-subsidy apostles have cleverly misled President Jonathan to support the removal of fuel subsidy in 2012. I am very confident that my position will be vindicated in the very near future. All over the world, political leaders that are known to be very keen in making a difference were more prone to making errors of judgment. The situation is worse with leaders that are mostly surrounded by people who believe a coin has only one side. Of course, President Jonathan has many of them around him. The earlier he realizes this, the better for him and the Nigerian masses.Apart from the conspicuous fact that Nigeria's present socio-economic framework is too weak to accommodate the pressure of fuel subsidy removal, my opinion is further strengthened by the shallow logic put forward by the two major anti-subsidy apostles: Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the minister of finance and economy and Lamido Sanusi, governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria. This duo will be quick to remind Nigerians that there is no fuel subsidy in Britain, United States, Germany, Spain Holland, and France. They have however deliberately refused to appreciate the fact that Nigerian workers do not earn as much as their contemporaries do in those named countries. Without doubt, Nigerians will accept to buy a liter of fuel for even N150 if public infrastructures are in excellent conditions and the salaries of public service workers are proportionate with what their contemporaries earn in Europe and America.In fact, the most worrying aspect of the arguments in support of the removal of fuel subsidy has to do with how it will help curb cross-border smuggling of petroleum products and the curbing of corruption in NNPC. It is sad that both Okonjo-Iweala and Sanusi are convinced about the existence of corruption at the nation's border posts and oil sector but not interested in going after those eating fat from it. The best they could do in fighting those stealing our common heritage is to punish the poor masses by increasing the price of petrol through the removal of fuel subsidy. Why are they afraid of the so-called 'cabal' and not the masses' The masses are still largely ignorant. All of these must bother President Jonathan. This is because should anything funny happen today, both Okonjo-Iweala and Lamido Sanusi will be on the next flight to the headquarters of World Bank or IMF for immediate engagement. We should not forget our past too quickly.
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