By Abubakar Shekara
Africa has the lowest number of deaths from COVID-19, but the ravaging impacts of the disease on the socioeconomic lives of the people on the continent, are unprecedented. “The shock and impact of COVID-19 have over-stretched Africa’s health care systems and plunged the continent into socioeconomic and political emergencies.”
This was part of the submission by Sokoto state governor, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal on Monday, in his keynote address aat the 2020 Conference of the African Bar Association in Niamey, Niger Republic.
Analysing the socioeconomic state of Africa before and during COVID-19, as well as projecting the situation of the continent beyond the pandemic, Tambuwal proffered that Africa’s best options, not only for mitigating the negative impacts of the pandemic, but also exploiting the changes occasioned by the disease to emerge as a greater economic power.
Turning crises into springboards is indeed, the new global philosophy, which Governor Tambuwal has keyed into, as one of the emerging crops of progressive leaders in Nigeria. His prescription for African countries is to learn from the bonding of European nations, pre-COVID-19 that enables them to deal with the shocks of the pandemic, while Africa, which is still struggling to give effect to its continental and regional bodies, suffers the brunt economically.
”Since 1960s when several African countries attained independence,” he observed that “there have been calls for better socio-economic integration and shift from the over-reliance on export of primary commodities. This led to the establishment of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) in 1963. The OAU did not make much progress but in 1991, it adopted the treaty that established the African Economic Community (AEC), also known as Abuja Treaty, designed to promote continental unity by means of harmonized economic policies among African states, using Regional Economic Communities (RECs).”
The best way towards closer and more beneficial economic integration, Tambuwal offered, is to pursue the ideals of other development agenda treaties such as the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD), Agenda 2063 and African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). That he emphasised, is “even more needed now with the negative impact of COVID-19 pandemic.’
Putting things in perspective, it is not a rosy picture, Tambuwal reported. “Africa accounts for around 17% of the world’s population, which only represents about 3% of the global GDP. This is a clear pointer to the fact that the continent has not done enough to harness its development potential, amidst the vast human and natural resources within her disposal.”
That scenario is only further aggravated, as …”countries in Africa are currently experiencing unprecedented effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, which has disrupted economies around the world,” he lamented, especially for single export mono-economies like Nigeria.
“…events in recent years”, Tambuwal explained, “have shown how susceptible African countries are prone to economic shocks and fluctuations in foreign currencies and commodity prices. Some are more vulnerable than others because their economies are dependent on the export of one or just a few commodities. When there is a downturn in commodity prices, mono-product economies such as Nigeria, Angola and Zambia accordingly, suffer economic stagnation.”
The capacity to manage debt has also weakened African countries, the Sokoto State Governor noted. “Debt sustainability by African countries continues to be an issue of great concern to policy makers and Development Finance Institutions (DFI)…
“Data from the World Bank Report reveals that countries in Sub-Saharan Africa recorded the fastest accumulation of external debt stock in 2019. This is attributed to a corresponding rise in the debt of regional economies such as Nigeria with an increase in its external debt from $50.4 billion to $54.8 billion, and South Africa’s from $173 billion to $188.1 billion.”
This picture is made more unattractive by the advent of COVID-19, with which “the inflow of remittances to African countries has significantly decreased. The World Bank reported that remittances to Sub-Saharan Africa grew by almost 10% in 2018 to about $46 billion and has been rising steeply year by year.”
Illustrating the situation further, the Sokoto state governor reminded the conference of other consequences of Covid-19, which include “the closure of airports and halting of transportation due to lock down emergency measures put in place to contain the virus (and) the closure of educational institutions from Kindergarten to universities.”
He also pointed that the shutting down of courts of law and work places “led to lower trade and investment, slump in demand associated with the lock-downs in the European Union and OECD countries; and logistics and supply shock upsetting domestic and intra-African trade.”
“Africa’s socioeconomic and political agenda requires resetting”, Tambuwal observed. And to achieve that, “laws and policy measures must be recalibrated to ameliorate the hardship occasioned by loss of jobs, investments, and income.”
There’s equally the need for “recovery strategies to include “a strong structural component to reduce dependence on external financial flows and global markets, and develop more value-addition, knowledge-intensive and industrialised economies, underpinned by a more competitive and efficient services sector,” he added.
Still, Africa’s most feasible option is the consolidation of continental initiatives towards greater self reliance, Tambuwal insisted. “The main legal plank of achieving the new socio-economic rebirth of the continent is the African Free Continental Trade Area (AfCTA), which came into force on 30th May 2019. The aim is to create a single continent-wide market for goods and services and to promote the movement of capital and persons…
“As the global economy is in turmoil due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the AfCTA presents a huge opportunity to help African countries diversify their exports, accelerate growth, and attract foreign direct investment. According to statistics published by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), the AfCTA is expected to expand the size of Africa’s economy to US$29 trillion by 2050.”
When the AfCTA becomes fully operational, he confidently pointed out, “it would ensure the expansion of market access for African exporters of goods and services, spur growth, boost job creation and take millions out of poverty. This will surely reduce the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on African economy.”
What then, is the role of lawyers in Tambuwal’s prescribed African strategy for braving Covid-19 and reaping its rewards? Certainly, no policy, national or continental, can succeed in contravention of the law and legal process.
“As lawyers, who are trained to promote the rule of law and ensure that the society is governed in accordance with the laws,” he noted, “we have a bounden of responsibility to speak out on the side of the people. For far too long, our continent has continued to lag on all known indices of human development. Yet after over 60 years, after political independence, Africa ought to have made the desired impact! Regrettably, we have continued to wallow in economic underdevelopment.”
All advancement however starts from the individual and local level. Proponents of development ought to certainly be judged by their own accomplishments at their level. And Tambuwal wasn’t leaving anyone in doubt as to his credentials as an advocate of genuine positive change.
The successes of his Government in Sokoto state Nigeria, in handling and managing the COVID-19 pandemic is an apt point of reference. An established taskforce team of health experts under the State’s Commissioner of Health carried out the sensitization, testing and case management of patients afflicted by the disease.
“Legal experts led by the Attorney General, came up with a regulation, the Sokoto State Infectious Disease Regulation 2020 under the Sokoto State Public Health Law 1985 as amended,” Tambuwal revealed, while the support of security agencies and the traditional institution was immediately enlisted.
His government procured and distributed freely to the people, face masks and hand sanitizers, while, “a locally fabricated hand washing equipment was developed in conjunction with UNICEF and installed in most public places”
The effort in Sokoto included testing centres set up at all entry points into the state. Isolation centres were established at Amanawa, Usman Danfodio University Teaching Hospital, Specialist Hospital Sokoto and Catholic Hospital, Sokoto.
These were complemented by rapid response teams provided with 254 ambulances with 10 operating in the capital city and 244 electoral wards in the state that attracted the commendation of the Federal Minster of Health.
Over 1,000 health and non-health works in the state carried out the sensitization of local communities. Contact tracing was massively undertaken, with the support of the National Electoral Commission, vehicles and their drivers available for the exercise.
Online radio lessons and lectures were organised and sponsored by the state government before the opening of schools to enable students carry on with their studies during the peak of the pandemic.
On the economic front, Tambuwal’s government supported Micro, Small and Medium enterprises with interest-free loans to stimulate the economy and save jobs, while tax holidays were granted and payment of water rates was suspended. Palliatives were distributed by both state and federal government, business organisation and NGO’s to the weak and vulnerable in the society.
The African Bar Association Conference in Niger Republic had the theme, ‘Resetting Africa’s Social-Economic and Political Agenda in Post Covid-19: How Lawyers Can Lead. And the keynote address by Aminu Waziri Tambuwal illustrated the capacity of members of learned profession to spearhead the new era of change for the African continent.
Shekara is Tambuwal’s Special Assistant on Public Affairs
