China-rose-from-the-ashes-of-obscurity-to-become-a-world-economic-power-what-excuse-do-nigeria-have-to-remain-underdeveloped

President Muhammadu Buhari and President Xi Jinping of China
 
CHINA ROSE FROM THE ASHES OF OBSCURITY TO BECOME A WORLD ECONOMIC POWER – WHAT EXCUSE DO NIGERIA HAVE TO REMAIN UNDERDEVELOPED?
Looking at China and Nigeria, there are commonalities and parallels that can be drawn. By size, Nigeria is about 10% of China; by population, it is about 10%; by regional relevance they share status symbols, internally, they are both endowed with abundant natural resources, etc. Furthermore, they have similarities and differences in historical legacy, historical development, pluralistic culture and so on. Like China, Nigeria is composed of numerous ethnic and religious groups and both have existed for thousands of years. While both countries have the largest population on their respective continents and vast natural resources, both have relatively low per-capita income with China working earnestly towards normalizing this anomaly.
But that is where it stops. China has gained stability and respect over the years. It has developed socialism with Chinese characteristics which is paying dividends. In terms of development, whether you look at it from GDP (Gross Domestic Product), GNP (Gross National Product), or Human Development Index, there is progress to show in all spheres.  Today, it can be argued that it is only China that has achieved the MDGs by 2015, and is already on the tract and verge of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The questions that should be in the minds of all leaders in the Nigerian Government, is how is it done (right), what have we done (wrong), or where do we start (and continue)? etc. Amongst the things we can learn from China is discipline of purpose, purposive planning, upholding of performance pledge and deliverability, etc.
We are greatly disturbed every time we consider the fact that Nigeria, despite having similar factors, human and natural resourcefulness, difficulties and experiences as a nation, just like other developed nations like China, Japan, USA have had and yet came out victoriously; the nation is still tagged a Third-World and “developing” country where the space between the rich and poor, the Government and the Governed, the haves and the have-nots, and the Public Masters and the Public (Common masses) – are increasing daily. All of which has made Nigeria to being pushed to the verge of becoming a tragedy as a nation, or as a failed state.
The question we often ask ourselves is this, if our Nigerian political leaders have widely traveled and have seen these other developed countries, met the men and women who lead these countries, walked the clean streets of their cities and travelled in the regular and regulated means of these countries, why can’t they replicate the same things back home in their country Nigeria? Have our leaders been encouraged to imitate these persons, places and things? Our political leaders have seen palaces and befitting environmental standard for the elites and regular masses in developed nations around the world but yet they come back home to their “glorified mansions” surrounded by dilapidated structures, hungry masses and little or no social amenities like good roads, steady power supply, etc. Unless we have an indigenous inspiration to make things better for ourselves, no listing of what others have done would inspire us to make things better.
Again, what has inspired others in the world to seek betterment of their people in their lifetime? What do they have that we cannot muster? Agreed that Poverty and disease are major inspirations for people to aspire to a life of sufficiency and health. But there is still something else. There is “the belief that poverty and ill-health is not the fate of any one.” Poverty and disease is not wished on anyone. That underlining belief that “poverty and disease can be avoided”, is what inspires the effort to seek better seedlings, better forms of food preservation, better basic infrastructure for all and sundry, deeper understanding of the causes of illness and disease and how to prevent them, etc. Without this “belief”, nothing will get done.
Take the China example for instance, it rose from obscurity and abandonment, to become a world power today. The question is, why can’t Nigeria, with similar experiences like that of China, rise from the ashes to become an economic power in the continent of Africa and the world too?  Some time, not too long ago, as noted by a public affairs analyst, Dare Babarinsa, we have been learning more about the ability of the Chinese to perform wonders of engineering. They are building the largest dam for Nigeria on the Mambilla Hill that, in six years time, promises to generate 3,050 megawatts of electricity. The dam is estimated to cost $5.8 billion with China paying for 75 per cent of the cost. Nigeria is going to bear only 15 per cent. Great bargain you will say. The government-owned China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC), which is handling the dam project, is also involved in many other constructions across the country. It is the flagship of the Chinese involvements in our country, especially in the building of public projects. They are building the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja. They have projects across the country. Indeed, there is probably no governor in Nigeria who has not visited China. We are told now that the future of Africa is in China. In fact, from 2000 to 2011, there are approximately 40 Chinese official development finance projects identified in Nigeria through various media reports. These projects range from a $2.5 billion loan for Nigerian rail, power, or telecommunications projects in 2008, to a MoU for $1 billion construction of houses and water supply in Abuja in 2009, and several rail networks.
However, nobody is talking about how did China become so economically powerful and wealthy to afford such huge aid investments in Africa? What lessons can we learn from China and become a better nation? As noted by Prof. Li Anshan, a Professor at the School of International Studies at Peking University, in one of his articles, he highlighted four key areas of “political leadership”, “social stability”, “agricultural production” and “initiative and aid”, in discussing China's developmental record and its potential lessons for Africa. Stressing the importance of a country's developing its own path, Li writes that foreign aid should not be permitted to become a permanent source of income or to compromise individual countries' sovereignty. In other words, if Africa, and indeed Nigeria, is to realize its bright future and harness the considerable potential of its human and natural resources, its governments must use their funds in ways which sincerely benefit areas most in need.
The truth is that, China’s development is simply a process of learning, learning from anybody who can provide a better way for development, and the process is still going on. To apply others’ experiences and lessons, that is, their successes and failures, to your own conditions, is the only applicable lesson that China can offer.
However, it is also imperative to note that it was Mao Zedong, who secured the future for China. At the beginning of the 20th Century, China was as backward as Nigeria. The country was divided by several colonizing powers, especially Japan and Britain. Though, the puppet emperor was toppled, foreign influence was still dominant despite the nationalist uprisings. Mao became one of the founders of the Communist Party in 1927, the year the Chinese Civil War started, and the fledgling movement was soon pitched against the entrenched regime of the Kuomintang led by Generalissimo Kai-Shek. The Civil War was fought with profound ferocity and after 22 years of struggle, the Communists came to power on October 1, 1949. That day, at the Gate of Heavenly Peace in Beijing, Mao declared: “The Chinese people have stood up.” Mao was a communist and he believed that the communist super power, the Soviet Union, would help China to industrialize. Soviet experts came in to help build roads, rail lines, airports and schools. They not only wanted to control China, they wanted to own it. China-Soviet split was inevitable and by 1958, China was struggling for freedom from its strong friend, the Soviet Union. The country was an anathema to the West at that period, which recognized Taiwan, the small island where the Kuomintang had established a government, and now it was facing a painful ditching by the Soviet Union. It was this split that made China to re-discover itself.
As they were pulling out, the Russians dismantled factories, ripped off rail lines and destroyed electric pylons and rendered the Chinese economy comatose. China became an isolated country, with only Albania, as its friend as most of the other communist countries sided with the Soviet Union. Faced with this great crisis, Mao decided on both the short term and the long-term solutions. In the short term, China decided to rely on its inner strength, knowledge and resources. In the long run, it sent its students to study in the best universities in Europe and the United States, to acquire knowledge that would help to transform China into a modern country. By 1972, American President Richard Nixon visited Beijing and ended the era of Chinese isolation.
Today, China is the second largest economic power. Its investment in knowledge acquisition all over the world has paid off. Its students continue to dominate many top universities in the world. The rulers of China focused on the imperatives of planning, persistence and implementation. They know that for China to join the league of developed nations, it must provide employment, encourage skill acquisition and improve the standard of living. Today, China manufactures everything from toothpicks to torpedoes, from cars to aircraft carriers. Today, Nigeria imports everything, including power generating sets and the ceremonial uniforms of its generals. But in Nigeria, it is our governors and other top officials who keep going to China “to attract foreign investments!” They want the Chinese to come and help us build our country; build our dams, our roads, our hospitals, our bridges, our airports and our industries. We did not ask the simple question: Was it the Americans who developed China? Or was it the Japanese or the Koreans?
As we speak, almost all the Chinese students under Chinese government scholarship in America’s best universities, are studying courses that have to do with the future. They study artificial intelligence, systems science and engineering, and hard-core courses for tomorrows World. Surprisingly, this is a deliberate state policy. You never see a Chinese student on scholarship studying arts, social sciences or arts. What is most troubling is that they study these courses in America and United Kingdom top Universities. They now have a concept called ‘Made in China 2025.”  It is a Chinese Development blueprint that had sent fear around the world. It is meant to transform China from a labor-intensive economy that makes toys, cloths, pharmaceutical to one that engineers advanced products like robots’ electric cars, and space explorations. The Chinese are believed to be the most determined species of the human race. Once they set their minds to achieve a goal nothing stops them. The Chinese kids are sent in droves to study unique courses like artificial intelligence, information systems, system science, robotic engineering, systems engineering in American schools.
While the economies of the world, including the United States are exporting production distribution and exchange in an era of globalization, China is pursuing an agenda of localizing production. They promote a policy to get almost 70 percent of their production value chain domiciled locally. This is very dangerous because in the future the entire world will answer to China in terms of production. My concern with China is how can a country and a people get it so right? Always ahead of the rest. Always scheming at a time our own kids are holidaying and eating barbecue in foreign restaurants. The more I study the Chinese, the more I fall in love with these guys. They have leaders that think. They have leaders that plan for tomorrow. More interesting, even children as young as five years in China know in every transaction, they have to eat up their opponents or be eaten.
Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the first Premier of the defunct Western Region (now balkanized into Delta, Edo, Ekiti, Lagos, Ondo, Ogun, Osun and Oyo) said the first requirement for good leadership “is the capacity to think.” He called it “mental magnitude.” We have no doubt that our leaders have the capacity to think. The problem is what they are thinking about. Are they thinking about the future of Nigeria or just the next election? Or are they thinking of what Diezani Alison-Madueke used to think about in that era when she was the Dragon-Queen of the Jonathan Court? Let us also be reminded that oil was discovered in China just two years before Nigeria’s discovery. But today all the items and hardware used in the extractive industry of China are produced there, from the ground to the point of usage for industrial purposes.
Mao was ruler of China for 27 years until he died in 1976. For that long reign, he travelled outside China only twice. Let us start by putting a six-month moratorium on foreign travels for our governors and ministers and let us see whether we might save enough foreign exchange to import rice for one year. By 1979 when Shehu Shagari was elected our President, Nigeria was the largest producer of rice in Africa. Today, we are the largest importer of rice on the continent, spending an average of One Billion Naira daily on the importation of the magic grain.
Like we have often reiterated, no foreigner can effectively and efficiently develop our country for us. That onerous task, no matter how challenging it might seem, only belongs to us and can best be done by us. So, it is high time our political leaders stop making excuses and start using their ‘thinking faculties aright’ in developing this nation and get it out of the league of Third World countries in no distant future.
 
 
Zik Gbemre.
 
 
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