Does Agriculture have the value that Peter Obi talks about?

Prof Paul A. Iji

I am very reserved about joining political campaigns in Nigeria.?I have been badly let down by Presidents whom I thought were going to turn the fortune of the country around.?On at least two occasions, I thought that I was going to pack my things, get back to Nigeria and help to grow the country.?And don’t get me wrong; I returned to Nigeria after my Masters in the UK and again returned home from Australia after my PhD.?What I saw was not hopeful.?I saw a country of very talented individuals being led by mediocres, many of them, additionally corrupt.?The talented population worked as individuals rather than as a team, and their efforts could never be harnessed – the cause of perennial brain drain.?

As someone recently put it; Nigeria plays its matches with the 10th Eleven.?This is a soccer analogy.?Every club plays real matches with its First Eleven.?If the club believes that the other team is weak, they would use the Second Eleven, maybe with a sprinkling of members of the First Eleven.?Rarely would a football club or a country field its Third Eleven but to every Nigerian who can think clearly, Nigeria happily fields its 10th Eleven, and we lose almost all our development matches.?In national life, these are important matches, related to development in all spheres of life.?We are playing matches against other countries in healthcare; education; security; infrastructure; employment, and youth empowerment.?Nigeria does not care – we still field the same tired and ineffective 10th Eleven.?

I promised my brother, Peter Obi, that I was going to campaign for him.?I wish I could do it as a full-time job but I have a full-time job to do.?However, my eyes are set on returning to Nigeria.?It is God’s own country.?No country would go through what Nigeria has experienced and still be intact.?We are free from natural disasters; it is only some people who have constituted themselves into human disasters.?The country needs to free itself from these human disasters and take its rightful place among the top countries of the world.?

The Obi-Datti ticket has presented Nigeria with an opportunity to rise from the dust.?It is Nigeria’s responsibility to take that opportunity.?It breaks my heart when I hear people say that this ticket is for 2027.?Does Nigeria have the luxury of doing the wrong things for the next four years??I do not think so.?Nobody is waiting for us.?

Obi has promised to leave the thieves to enjoy the loot that they have stashed outside the country.?Wise decision.?As he rightly said: you do not close your shop to run after thieves; a wise shop owner prevents other thieves from coming into the shop.?The incoming government does not need to waste its resources in running after the looters of the past 24 years, or as some believe, of the past 62 years.?Once the country is put right, the thieves who have looted Nigeria almost dry and are building other countries will sell their assets and relocate them to Nigeria.?It is expensive to maintain assets outside Nigeria.?The taxman will be after you day and night, and of course, most of those countries are full of natural disasters.?Nigeria is the place to invest.?

We need to strengthen our local purchasing power and bring in investment.?There is no other sector better positioned than agriculture to achieve this plan.?In the next few articles, I will look at Nigeria’s agricultural potential and see how we stand in rising to the top.?Like Peter Obi, I am not going to dwell in crying over lost opportunities but try to point the way forward.?I do not expect any compensation; all I want is for Nigeria to rise.?Nigeria is still full of very talented individuals who are better positioned than me to serve with the President of hope.

The Obi-Datti ticket is pan-Nigerian; it has nothing to do with Biafra or any region of Nigeria.?Nigeria is not working at its potential, and this must change.

Prof Paul A. Iji is the Dean, College of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Fiji National University ; Author of Writing and publishing your research (hard and Kindle editions) and A guide for young Africans growing up overseas . CreateSpace/Amazon. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not reflect the views of his employers.?Please feel free to share. ?