FEATURE ARTICLE

Adebimpe Onifade, MBA, Ph.D.Tuesday, May 19, 2015
[email protected]
New Jersey, USA

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EXPECTATIONS OF ROBUST FOREIGN POLICY: (PART II)

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Continued from Part I

oreign Resident Nigerians (FRN): This aspect of the article on Foreign Policy of Nigeria perhaps needs a separate write-up because of its overarching importance and wide-ranging ramifications. In the meantime however, it is the opinion of this article that the incoming administration should do more to harness the indisputable relevance of Nigerians in Diaspora. While President Obasanjo even as military Head of State had always encouraged the return of Nigerians abroad and even went ahead and created office of the Diaspora; our dear country Nigeria would benefit greatly, if the incoming administration takes more interest in harnessing the potentials of FRN.

In this article, FRN is discussed without any particular order on the following aspects: the remittances; skills transfer, harnessing of the economic advantages of FRN, and sustainable development of the next generations of FRN. The World Bank defines Personal remittances as the sum of personal transfers and compensation of employees. For further understanding of remittances, readers are referred to World Bank website for the definition of remittance. According to Migration Institute publication of 1 June 2003, remittance data have limitations and the estimates obtained should be interpreted with caution. On the one hand, official remittance figures may underestimate the size of flows because they fail to capture informal remittance transfers, including sending cash back with returning migrants or by carrying cash and/or goods when migrants return home. On the other hand, official remittance figures may also overestimate the size of the flows. Other types of monetary transfers including illicit ones cannot always be distinguished from remittances

From the annual computation of remittances by the IMF from the international balance of payments, FRN remittances were estimated at $21 billion in 2013. Almost the same amount was calculated for 2014. This is a stupendous amount. In Africa, Nigeria received the highest remittances from her citizens' resident abroad and the fifth highest in the world. According to World Bank Press release of 11 April, 2014, India remained in the top spot, with $70 billion in remittances in 2013. Other large recipients were China ($60 billion), the Philippines ($25 billion), Mexico ($22 billion), Nigeria ($21 billion), Egypt ($17 billion), Pakistan ($15 billion), Bangladesh ($14 billion), Vietnam ($11 billion) and Ukraine ($10 billion).

Considering that both India and China each has population of more than one billion people; therefore, based on the population figures, the per capita remittance of FRN is higher than foreign-resident Indians and Chinese. This presumably assumes that the per capita impact of the remittance would be higher in Nigeria than in the more populous nations. Furthermore, the comparison of the repatriated amount with the total GDP (total value of goods and services) is far greater for Nigeria ($521.8 billion) than for India ($1.88 trillion) or China ($9.24 trillion). It can be interpreted from the aforesaid that remittance has far greater economic importance in Nigeria than in India or China. To put a sharper focus on the importance of the remittances of FRN, let us consider the data from the recently completed auditing of NNPC by PricewaterhouseCoopers. From the summary of audit, the approximate total revenue from petroleum proceeds (for 19 months) was about $69.34 billion from January 2012 to July 2013, and out of this some $18.53 billion was used for operations and other expenses, this left only $50.81 billion as "net profit" that was credited into the Federation account. Comparing the credited amount into the Federation Account to the $21 billion remittance from FRN, it is quite clear that the remittances contributed almost as much of half of annual national income from petroleum.

This huge amount of remittance from FRN, by definition and how it is computed, is not necessarily "cash revenue" like the proceeds from sale of petroleum. Nonetheless, it is more reliable than the selling price of the barrel of Bony Light Crude, and arguably, did not cost as much as $18 billion to generate. For further appreciation of the magnitude of the remittance of FRN, consider that in 2013, the total GDP of some of our neighbors- Ghana is $48.1 billion, Republic of Benin is $8.3 billion, Togo and Sierra Leone $4.3 billion and $4.1 billion, respectively. From this comparative data with our neighbors, the annual remittance of FRN is almost half of GDP of Ghana, almost three times the GDP of Republic of Benin and almost five times GDP of both Togo and Sierra Leone.

Experts agree that the top sources of remittance to Nigeria are US, UK and Canada. According to Migration Policy Institute publication of July 2014, some 380, 000 Nigerian Americans are in the United States and the Nigerian diaspora in the US is highly educated with some 29 percent of those 25 years or older holding a Master's degree, or Ph.D. or advanced professional qualifications. The educational qualifications of other African immigrants are also very high, and this shows the importance of education to migration and potential remittances. There is inextricable linkage between education and foreign policies. The brain drain of yesteryears has become brain gain of today and foreseeable future. There is simple message for the government of Nigeria: revamp and globalize the educational curriculum in Nigeria and articulate a working strategy to harness the monetary, technical, experiential and "professional" advantages inherent in our overseas human assets. In the days of British Empire, their vast wealth was in their overseas wealth, and today's MNCs corporations are also deriving huge incomes from foreign businesses. This article submits that there should be mutually workable arrangements to allow such FRN to return home on regular basis.

Some advantages cum characteristics of the remittances are: predictability, higher than Official Development Assistance (ODA) and Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), increases sovereign credit worthiness, often significantly higher than the official reports because of informal channels of remittances, help in poverty reduction, helps in education and better quality of life, buying of properties including landed properties, support local construction activities, help stabilizes exchange rate through supply of hard currency to meet local demand. In the World Bank Press release of 11 April, 2014, Remittances remain a key source of external resource flows for developing countries, far exceeding ODA and more stable than private debt and portfolio equity flows. For many developing countries, remittances are an important source of foreign exchange, surpassing earnings from major exports, and covering a substantial portion of imports. Remittances have become a major component of the balance of payments of nations. There is no doubt that these flows act as an antidote to poverty and promote prosperity.

An invaluable publication titled "Leveraging Migration for Africa - Remittances, Skills, and Investments was written by Dilip Ratha and his colleagues at World Bank in 2011. In pages 47-48 of the publication, the authors wrote "remittances improve sovereign creditworthiness and the external debt sustainability of African countries. Remittance receipts are associated with reductions in poverty; increased household resources devoted to investment, and improved health and education outcomes". On page 57 of the book, the authors wrote that securitization of future remittance flows can increase the access of African banks and firms to international capital markets; it can also be used to fund longer-term development projects, such as infrastructure and low-income housing. Innovative financing mechanisms such as issuance of diaspora bonds and securitization of future remittance flows can help finance big-ticket projects, such as railways, roads, power plants, and institutions of higher learning that will, step by step, help to transform Africa. According to Dilip Ratha and other experts, African countries can potentially use future remittances (and other future receivables) as collateral to raise financing from international capital markets for financing development projects.

Unlike Nigeria however, India maximizes the value of her global migrant workforce including the development of her national capacity especially at the cutting edges of technology and engineering. Even China, South Korea and Japan valued their foreign resident nationalities and seriously incentivized them to return either temporarily or permanently to support technological development of their homeland. Pakistan's nuclear technology was reportedly developed and led by Abdul Qadeer Khan who lived in Netherlands for a long time before returning home. There are FRN that can contribute to Nigeria's advancement in science, technology, engineering and medicine as well as other areas of human endeavors. FRN in medical fields around the world remains one of Nigeria's best representatives and one of our major contributors to remittances to Nigeria. Nigerian medical personnel are well-respected globally for their professionalism especially those that graduated on or before mid-1990s. It is no gainsaying that wherever you go especially in the West and some very far away countries and you see an African medical practitioner of sub-Saharan origin, there is almost 60-70 percent possibility that s/he is from Nigeria. We have produced great medical Doctors serving other people around the world. As such, if Nigeria has a well-developed mechanism for skills transfer, these same reputable doctors can be coming home on regular basis to further develop the next generation of Doctors that will serve the world. The same applies to other medical disciplines. This article uses Medical personnel for the convenience of the discussion, and it submits that Nigerians professionals in various fields are generally above average in their performance compared to their peers in all their chosen careers. Agreeably, the foregoing is a proud sweeping statement.

Towards devising the strategies to harness "brain gain" of FRN, our FRNs have to be deliberately sensitized, incentivized and assured of the moral obligation to help our native country. It is sad, but true, that the spirit of citizenship and nationalism is weak among Nigerians. Nigeria is our home, and will always remain our home country. Many FRN attended free education in Nigeria and some lucky ones even went outside the country on scholarship up to University level. We could reasonably agree that our beloved country helped us to have a comparative advantage in the global employment marketplace. The almost free tuition in Nigerians schools on or prior to 1995 has generally supported training and education of most Nigerians that are now FRN. Somehow all FRNs have been given the opportunity to enjoy some levels of free tuition through primary, secondary and tertiary education in Nigeria. This is because wherever you meet a Nigerian overseas, one crucial distinguishing factor is his capacity to communicate in English language- the presumed global lingua franca. This is a product of national policy on Education.

Furthermore, to develop our future migrant workforce, we have to integrate language proficiency within the overall education and FP of the nation. It is the opinion of this article that Nigeria's education Policy should include learning of French and Arabic languages, and possibly some introductory Kiswahili. Some even suggest learning Chinese considering its increasing global importance. [This article clarifies that the study of Arabic does not mean Islamization, the reason is to make more Nigerians marketable in GCC where economic growth would likely continue into the foreseeable future. On the same token, Kiswahili could help more Nigerians to explore marketability in the East and South East African markets]. It is crucial that as Nigerians continue to go overseas for jobs opportunity, they should be adequately prepared to take on the future. Experts agree that mobility of labor globally will continue to increase; therefore, as part of our robust FP, the current administration may wish to address the importance of second language in our curriculum starting from High School.

Within the context of integration of national education policy with FP wherever applicable, it is also crucially important that we address the quality of our graduates from all levels of education in Nigeria starting from elementary to University at the highest level and professional certification. Since, mid 1990s, Nigeria's educational standards have been subject of controversy in terms of quality. Ostensibly, we have produced large numbers of graduates who might not be adequately prepared for the future ahead of them. Post-graduate and professional qualification remains better options to get jobs and everyone seems to be pursuing this. Having higher degrees is a competitive professional advantage. We have got to make better use of this opportunity. We have got to ensure that this trend continues. We have got to ensure that those that have similar qualifications from home could be seen to match those that acquire the degrees overseas. Nonetheless, we could in addition develop our intermediate and or middle-level manpower to widen opportunities for Nigerians that may wish to work overseas. For instance, Philippines is particularly good in producing Nurses and middle-level manpower for global employment markets through a purposive curriculum development and constant upgrading of the training to remain within the state of the art. The message is that the incoming administration should seriously look into how we can help more Nigerians to become international professionals and patriotic international businessmen.

If we cannot sell much manufactured products in the international market, we can export our trained talented and entrepreneurial human resources into the international market. The current FRN have shown we could do it, and in monetary terms, the billions of dollars remitted gives further justification for developing these sectors of the economy. Considering that a crucial part of global economy now and into the foreseeable future will be knowledge economy. Nigeria can reposition and prepare her citizens to tap into this lucrative area and it could become a veritable export. Educated citizenry is a powerful and potentially wealthy citizenry.

Recognizing the crucial importance of FRN, the FP of the incoming administration may endeavor to do more to support welfare and greater contributions of our citizens working outside the country. Some suggestions are as follow. (i) It is important that we have reliable data on FRN to work with, and this could be done by a census of FRN. We could do this through internet registration and by post to cover all FRN including their children. We have to design the census questionnaire to be simple and informative. (ii) Better consular services to FRN and the possibility of increasing the local offices in the US, UK and Canada to serve regions that have large populations of Nigerians. Enabling Diaspora through improved consular services through internet-based renewal for consular transactions could be explored. (iii) FRN will like to be able to vote from overseas, therefore, facilitation of their participation in electoral voting in Nigeria. (iv) Direct affiliation of Nigerian banks with some major Banks in the US, UK, Canada, Australia and Middle East and some other countries that are major sources of remittances of FRN will facilitate interbank transfer and reduce transaction cost of remittances. (v) Improving business environment in Nigeria to support direct investment from FRN. (vi) Improvement in cargo and freight services to enhance trade with FRN and from FRN back to Nigeria. FRN like other migrant workers like to patronize goods from their country of origin. (vii) Revitalization of Nigeria in Diaspora Organization (viii) Rationalization of our Embassies to match countries with high balance of payments and trade with Nigeria. On the same token, Dilip Ratha and his co-authors in Chapter 4 (pages 147-193) concluded that policy makers can help leverage the contributions of migrants to the development of Africa, reduce remittance costs, improve the efficiency of remittance markets in both origin and destination countries, and address the needs of the origin countries without restricting the emigration of high-skilled professionals.

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and Official Development Assistance (ODA): Upon rebasing the Nigerian economy to accommodate the expansion to the GDP due to the major changes in telecommunications section and other service industry, the country became the largest in Africa. Nigeria economy is estimated to be $521 billion. The FDI into the country remains very low compared to our potentials, and many reasons atop of which are corruption, suboptimal business environment, poor physical infrastructures, and inadequate FP support strategy could be the reason. The large population of Nigeria is a veritable asset for business because just like democracy the core advantage lies in the numbers. FP of Nigeria in the new dispensation should articulate strategies to optimize the flow of FDI. Rwanda remains the best country to start business in Africa since you can get a company registered so quickly. India economy is almost a trillion dollar and yet UK is still giving ODA of up more that $250 million per annum to her former colony. Without appearing as beggar nation, if India can still get such amount of ODA, it could still be meaningful to us in Nigeria especially in the Education and Health Sector or any that the Donor may be interested. In the past decade, Governments of India and China have been competing for establishing Special Relationship with Africa. France also organizes the French-Africa Forum regularly, and United States has joined the bandwagon. Japan also organizes theirs with African leaders. It is crucial that the new administration articulate a Donor-country specific portfolio with which we should engage these countries. For instance in Government of China and Pakistan have just China has just agreed on infrastructures financing up to $45 billion. On the financing of infrastructures, Nigeria also probably stands to gain from the newly established International Infrastructural Bank that China and other BRIC countries established.

Returning back to the issue of developing portfolio of direct assistance to be requested from these Donor Countries, there is nothing shameful to make these solid requests, and certainly as expected in diplomacy, we may have to give something back in return. A Nigerian Professor in the US told the authors some years back that in 1981, when Nigerian President and India President were having audience at the White House with the President Regan, our President requested for assistance on export of rice to Nigeria while his counterparts from India requested for more cooperation on civilian nuclear technology. A serious Nigeria FP could get serious cooperation from the government of US in power generation including from gas turbines since President Obama mentioned that the US would like to cooperate with African governments in these areas. We should be deliberate and futuristic in our demand with respect to ODA.

Support for Nollywood, Entertainment Industry, Fashion Industry and Religious Pilgrimage into Nigeria: Nigerian movies popularly called "Nollywood Movies" have assumed global popularity. Also, the Nollywood movies and FRN have both popularized the "African Dress or simply Nigerian Fashion Industry." It is a thing of pride that wherever you go they will say 'African Dress", which in real terms, the design and origin are from Nigeria and West Africa. Our traditional dress codes have become increasingly popular fashion globally. Indeed, some of leading African women holding internationally prominent posts have popularized African Dress. President of Liberia is fond of her African dress, so also the former President of Zambia and our dear Minister of Finance Dr. Okonjo-Iwela. Our Nigerian ladies in the diaspora also deserve huge credits for popularizing the African Dress. Nigerian entertainment industry-artistes, musicians and stand-up comedians etc are generating products that sources of foreign exchange. In the same respect, the reverse exportation of Christianity back into Europe and other parts of the world led by Nigerian Christian Men of God is becoming significantly noticeable.

Nollywood, Entertainment Industry, Fashion Industry and Religious Pilgrimage are worthy and legitimate sources of veritable revenue and goodwill to the nation. As such, a clear-cut aspect of our FP to directly support the development of these burgeoning industries is relevant. The nation could develop policy in all areas that will harness the potentials of these industries with especial focus on quality assurance standards, copyright protection, foreign exhibitions, stable financing opportunity as well as Academies to regulate official training. On the same token, there are evidences of growing importance of "Religious and spiritual tourism" into Nigeria. Some of our major Preachers in Christianity have great popularity outside the country. It is no gainsaying that Pastor T.B. Joshua is far more popular in South African countries than possibly in Nigeria, so also Pastor Adeboye of the Redeem Church in North America and Europe. Nigerian Christian Preachers have spread Christianity as far as former Soviet Bloc. The Government could "facilitate Religious Tourism" to Nigeria through expedited visa processing and adequate security in the country starting from the airport. Indeed, a challenge to Nigerian Churches overseas would be to emulate the humanitarian, medical and educational assistances rendered to Africa by the older Christian denominations like Catholic, Baptist, Methodist, etc. Public policy on the entertainment and fashion industry as well as Religious institutions would go a long way to generate employment opportunities for our youths in addition to forex. On the Islamic side too, there are some religious leaders that are very well respected outside the country

Gateway of Commerce and Sustained Leadership in West Africa: Unarguably, the first orbit of influence of the FP of Nigeria is our immediate neighbors in West Africa. Nigeria being the largest economy in the region has similar regional status as the United States in North America, Brazil in South America, and South Africa in the SADC Regional Economic Commission. It will be appropriate for Nigeria to get its acts together by taking up the natural role that the Almighty has endowed the country with. We should be the "Gateway of Commerce" in West Africa. Our Land, Air and Maritime services have to be seriously upgraded to facilitate more business through Nigerian ports. Whereas our leadership role in the sub-region is never underestimated, we need to strengthen our sub-regional influence. Good enough, most countries in West Africa see us as brotherly. Nevertheless, there are some crucial issues that need Nigeria's leadership. Some among them is containment of organized crimes; drug trafficking, terrorism, Ebola scourge, and ensuring deepening of democracy.

Conclusion

Parts I and II of this article on Nigeria's FP strongly advocate for a robust policy linkages in our national education, foreign interests, economy and business. Foreign Resident Nigerians and their huge remittances deserves special significance in addition to their potential roles in advancing national development in all ramifications of human endeavors and with particular references to science, technology, engineering and medicine. The reinvigoration of Nigeria's continental leadership, proposal on the establishment of the Office of Special Envoy for Africa to demonstrate Nigeria's full engagement at resolving conflicts and bring durable peace to hotspots on the continent, leadership within the UN were discussed in part I. For the second part of the article, the criticality of FRN and the need to fully harness their potentials was discussed alongside positive economic diplomacy on attracting DFI, ODA and joining the international infrastructure bank that is being led by China. The article concludes that the incoming President has shown his interest in international engagements at all fronts; therefore, a clear policy articulation to implement his vision for Nigeria is needed with full cooperation of the citizens.

May God Bless Nigeria and Guide our Leaders Right.

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