Proposed privatisation of airports

Muritala Mohammed International Airport

You heard it: They eagerly wish to privatise the airports next. The Jonathan administration has a single legacy to its name: Privatisation. Inherited from the Obasanjo administration, the President’s godfather, the Nigerian government is in a hurry to sell every national asset sellable to its friends. Despite all past sales of national assets having no record of success and easing the problems, but having rather ended up in greater burden for the people for the same poor service, the government unabashedly forges ahead proposing more and more privatisations to ensure that Nigeria is completely sold to the cabal before their day is up.

The privatisation of NEPA/PHCN has resulted in customers paying more for no power. The Nigerian people via the government have been forced to bail out some billionaires who bought the PHCN with government subsidies and billions in government cash that have been donated to bail out the private PHCN. In contrast, small business owners in Nigeria do not get these government handouts to help them float. And these bailouts are in addition to the ridiculously cheap amounts these national assets were “dashed” to the cabal who right after the privatisation was publicised for having made some quick billions over night. The Nigerian masses were forced to literally dash the cabal N2.6 trillion in the privatisation sham earlier this year. Our money is being poured into their pockets every day as we wallow in horrible poverty and are denied prosperity, dignity and hope.

The ban on car importation to enable private companies to reek profits from foreign partnered car assembly plants in Nigeria has led to – as we predicted – the skyrocketing of car prices in Nigeria, now out of the reach of the common man. And with no public transport system first put in place to protect the middle class and 100 million desolate Nigerians living under a dollar-a-day according to latest counts by the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics, people will be forced to walk, and the few fortunate proletariat will be dragged into taking high interest usury loans from the cabal-run banks to finance cars from the few, exorbitantly priced selections assembled locally.

Yet, despite the massive direct looting of public funds by these government officials and their cronies, they also wish to loot and subvert all public assets before their tenure is up. Sixteen years of this democracy has robbed Nigerians of billions of dollars and billions more in public assets. The Nigerian masses are being turned into end-time scenario slaves in their country. Even roads are not spared as they are being privatised. Our food is not spared either as the so-called Green-revolution being promoted earnestly by the Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Adesina Akinwumi, is rendering our farmers dependent of GMO Big Corp. seeds that are destructive to the land in the long run and force farmers to a state of chronic suicidal dependence on big farm and Big Corp. banks for patented seeds every season (You cannot replant most GMO seeds from old harvest season stock by design and by law).

It can be recalled that Haitian farmers in 2010, after the earthquake, burnt donated Monsanto seeds due to their experience with the dangers this Big Corp. business posed. (See: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/beverly-bell/haitian-farmers-commit-to_b_578807.html)

What has been experienced thus far in terms of the Obasanjo-Jonathan privatisation mania is just a tip of the iceberg. Once Jonathan wins in 2015 and enters his next four years (third term, totalling 12 years in Aso Rock), there will be full swing privatisation of everything in Nigeria; water, food, airports, roads, even air.

Did we not learn anything from the similar event in the US history – the Robber Baron period associated with the 1934 Great Depression; and are we not learning anything from the crash of capitalism in the Western world where after giving too much power to the cabal, the global recession hit and the government had to start taking over and controlling all industries?

Selling a people to a handful of individuals, is apart from being evil, suicidal and simply not sustainable.

What is peculiar is that if indeed the government knows that it cannot handle the operation of national assets, due to its incompetence; does such an incompetent government have the credibility to conduct privatisation exercises? And why does the government not first privatise itself?