Question: Who is the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria? Options: (A) Sarah Alade; (B) Sanusi Lamido Sanusi; (C) Godwin Emefiele (D) Jim Osayande Obazee; (E) None of the above. Please shade the correct answer. The above is an examination question recently encountered by a friend but please dont ask me for his name. He said he could not pick A because Mrs Alade, the acting CBN Governor in a period of transition, wields little or no authority. He said he could not pick B either because, even though President Goodluck Jonathan recently affirmed that Sanusi remains the CBN Governor, he is still on suspension. My friend said he also could not pick C because even though Emefieles appointment was confirmed by the Senate yesterday, he would still have to wait for Sanusis tenure to expire before assuming office. For some minutes, according to my friend, he toyed with the idea of picking D because, as he explained, the Executive Secretary of the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRCN) is the man who has been calling all the shots at the CBN in recent weeks. But then he demurred because he could not lay his hands on where Obazee derives his powers from. So at the end, he settled for E which means that today, for all practical purposes, Nigerias apex bank is without a substantive Governor! Given the foregoing, it came as no surprise that Standard and Poors (S&P), one of those international financial agencies whose ratings the managers of our economy like to flaunt, has put a question mark on Nigerias stable outlook rating, citing dearth of new information on the country and the uncertainty surrounding monetary policies. While stating that the suspension of the CBN Governor amounted to government interference with monetary policies, S&P said it was placing the country on a credit watch for a period of one week as a result of the appeal by the federal government. As a result, we are placing our long-term sovereign credit ratings on Nigeria on Credit Watch with negative implications, S&P stated rather ominously. Before I proceed, it bears repeating that I have made my position very clear about Sanusis gross act of insubordination to President Jonathan, especially considering the reckless manner in which he went about touting some CBN laws which he believes make him untouchable (thisdaylive/articles/sarki-goma-zamani-goma-/172493/). As a student of power politics, I am aware, as British philosopher, John Locke, argued in The Second Treatise of Government: And, A Letter Concerning Toleration, that the people sometimes allow their rulers to do several things of their own free choice, where the law is silent...and their acquiescing in it when so done. Whatever the law cannot provide for, according to Locke, must necessarily be left to the discretion of him that has the executive power in his hands, to be ordered by him as the public good and advantage shall require...
Posted on: Thu, 27 Mar 2014 16:10:24 +0000