Project Summary

Concept Note on Alternative Development Direction and Ideology for Nigeria.

This Project is basically about a new economic direction and ideology which will boost domestic harmony necessary to arrest our economy’s real growth drought, extreme conditions and poverty, large scale unemployment, deadly insecurity and the dislocation of the old economy that created them with collective effort.

Global Perspective of Our Nation’s Real Challenge

Basis for the Intervention.

1. By the arrangement of nature, no nation can or had achieved economic development on the know and habit of the first order;
2. Our nation’s transition challenges have assumed a crisis dimension which is a clear indication that our country is long overdue to change both which will then enable it to move up to the next economic height where real development begins;
3. The global development community, under the auspices of the UN Economic Commission for Africa, established in 1999 that the current orthodox development concept and its education which Africa adopted from the onset as a colonial subject and continue to operate till this day have grown fundamentally deficient and cannot lead any African country to a new economic height that is sustainable which will be required to resolve today’s complications without significant upgrade even if the country is managed by angels;
4. Since 2001 when the effort of the African leaders to develop the alternative concept, which alone can upgrade the current orthodox concept and education failed, all Nigerian governments across partisan line had also confirmed that a new development concept is indeed required to end our nation’s economic crisis, confessed that government is not in the position to design or implement the alternative concept without organized support from the elite community, which is absolutely correct and had called on those who can to come forward and assist. Unfortunately, the current policy structure has no window for alternative knowledge and this could not but build up to today’s complications;
5. Military Generals, as with the global knowledge community, have confirmed that conventional military approach alone cannot end the insecurity battle, even as concern rises about the apparent sabotage of Nigeria by her citizens on many axis including the war fronts and;
6. History is absolutely clear that both kinetic and Non- kinetic strategies that ended insecurity wars everywhere benefited from high capacity innovation factored into political, justice, educational and economic finesse which government do not and cannot generate or deliver alone.

It is on account of the above realities that we have created this project to provide the framework for broad national engagement of key stakeholders of the Nigeria project with the government to share a new, comprehensive and unconventional solution to our nation’s unity, security and economic dislocation underlying today’s complications, as established by conclusive new studies; to interrogate its core elements and particulars of its implementation and to guide the process to elite consensus, using the Alternative Development Ideology that emerged from our forty years conclusive research work on the subject as a precision guide. This, we believe, will then persuade the government to adopt the new solution. As it does, it will get the level of citizens’ commitment that it takes to successfully transform and jumpstart an economy after transformation and this will resolve the other collateral issues to restore real peace and inclusive prosperity in our nation. As history has shown copiously, wherever the University guides broad national conversation on new development knowledge to broad elite consensus at turning point, the new knowledge gets automatic entry into the nation’s development education and this will put more subtle pressure on government to adopt the concept which it cannot resist. This is exactly what our dear nation Nigeria needs today and precisely what this intervention seeks to facilitate.

The primary aim of this intervention is to activate the intellectual content of our base knowledge so that our collective reason will begin to operate optimally at a new height above the primary resource trap ahead of our nation’s entry into knowledge economy which is the next destination.

Key Problem and Solution.

The driving element of our nation’s intractable problems, it must be emphasized, is the inability of successive governments to transform our economy since our local population grew beyond the size that can sustained by primary resources alone so that our country is fully able to get more from the global economy to meet the extra needs of our growing population on a sustainable basis, arising from the absence of precise strategy on how to transform an economy in current development knowledge and education. 

The ultimate solution is the transformation of our nation’s Economy which will automatically activate our secondary growth window so that the country is fully able to get more resources from the global economy to meet the extra needs of its extra population. This is one exercise that government do not and cannot deliver alone without organized and lead support from the elite community. It is, everywhere, preceded by broad national engagement which generates social equilibrium that reconciles the society with the State and activate the new national spirit which enables the citizens to overcome partisan acrimony and division to work in harmony with the government to transform the economy so that it is fully able to provide the framework of the new and productive economy that can meet the extra needs of a growing population on a sustainable basis amongst other things.

The central objective of this intervention is to expose Nigerians to the wide range of unimaginable and very fundamental deficit in the current development knowledge and education underlying our nation’s intractable development troubles which will require only broad national consensus and partnership to fix, particularly, the absence of precise lessons on how transition nations activate the secondary growth window of their economy when their local population grows beyond the size that can be sustained by primary resources alone which, everywhere, enable developing nations to meet the extra needs of their growing population on a sustainable basis. This exercise, everywhere ends transition crisis which is a natural development problem that dovetails into severe economic and security complications when it lasts longer than necessary, as is the case with our dear nation Nigeria today. This new awareness will, on the one hand, precise stakeholders’ understanding of the real issues that brought our nation to today’s insecurity and economic dislocation and how we can get out of it, and on the other, activate our collective resolve to work in harmony with the government according to the nature’s law to defeat the twin evils and the socio-political conditions that created them to the glory of God and the Black race.

What makes this intervention even more imperative is not just that our country is indeed trapped in a problem that was created by education but also because problems that are created by education soon transmutes into second degree psychiatric disorder so that those caught in the web will not even realize that they have the problem let alone how to free themselves from the trap. Unless and until the disorder is dislodged from its subconscious haven with superior knowledge carefully packaged and delivered through broad national conversation, any country so affected cannot know real peace and inclusive prosperity even if it is managed by angels. This had been Africa’s development nemesis, not just Nigeria’s, for which this intervention seeks to fix.          

The Intervention has Seven Basic Targets namely:

1. To reconcile Nigerians with the Nigeria State on the one hand and, on the other, to reconcile both with the new realities of Nigeria’s development problems and solution as established by conclusive new studies such that will establish broad elite consensus on the new direction and destination for the national economy and the strategy to get there for which the majority will be committed to its success;
2. To introduce high capacity justice system scheme which will restore the collective ownership of the Nigeria project to consolidate the reconsolidation so that the majority will be fully committed to the new work to restore the national economy and security;
3. To introduce True Democracy template which will restore the faith of Nigerians in democracy such that will, on the one hand, place the management of the Nigeria project firmly on the hands of Nigerians according to the nature’s laws and, on the other, induce general elections to always boost only national unity, not fault lines, so that the national economy will always get the level of citizens commitment that it takes to advance the common good on all fronts;
4. To introduce Superior Management Systems that will place the responsibilities of managing the nation and its economy firmly in the hands of Nigerians as envisaged by true democracy such that will shut down all windows of systemic abuse and corruption in the nation, dismantle all obstacles on the path of new knowledge that the economy will need to grow in real terms and entrench integrity in domestic relations so that governance and economic management will begin to run seamlessly on the basis of all that is true and just for the people, which is a pre-condition for economic success at the knowledge phase of development;
5. To activate the Secondary Growth Window and Productivity Capacities of the national economy and put them efficiently to the service of the domestic capacity so that the economy is fully able to do just about anything, including creating a diversity of secondary domestic products that can compete globally, which will then enable the country to get enough resources from the global economy to meet the extra needs of her growing population on a sustainable basis;
6. To introduce High Capacity Innovation across a wide range of sectors which will then enable us to activate all the dormant capacities of the economy to create large scale new jobs and use them to eliminate extreme conditions and large scale unemployment as a deliberate strategy to, first, complement force in the effort to end wide spread security challenges in our nation; second, to protect the gifted thinkers which our economy will need to compete effectively at the global economy going forward and; third give the economy the comprehensive big push that it will need to takeoff effectively in the new order and;
7. To introduce Advanced Development Education which will upgrade the intellectual content of our human resources and align the mindset of our citizens from childhood with the thrust of knowledge economy for sustainability.

Other Key objectives of the intervention are as follows:

1. To provide the ideal justice system structure that will close up the gaps which enable separatist tendencies to polarize the people so that commitment of the majority to the progress of the nation will be permanent;
2. To create an intellectual framework for citizens’ interface with the government in the management of the economy as envisaged by true democracy going forward;
3. To create the framework for pioneer Economy Research Institution that will take over the responsibility of coordinating the nation’s economic policy and priority processes after transformation;
4. To instate the universities at the control post of the nation’s new knowledge gateway which will permanently dismantle the obstacles that nature and conventions do place on the path of new knowledge in transition societies which will then guarantee sustainable supply of superior knowledge to the economy at the new height and;
5. To provide the superior development education that will upgrade our human resource capacity and align the mindset of citizens from childhood with the habit of knowledge economy for sustainability and the stability of the new order.

The beauty of the new agenda which will guarantee its acceptability to all stakeholders is that it will:

1. Introduce only the fourth and superior arm of the new growth driver which is knowledge; the other three preferred growth drivers being oil and gas, agriculture and solid minerals;
2. Knowledge growth driver will run smoothly alongside the three preferred growth drivers until it establishes its superiority by which time government will need no advocacy to make knowledge and factors that support its efficiency first line charges on investment priority, which will then stabilize the economy at the knowledge phase;
3. Knowledge growth driver will create far more jobs than the three preferred growth drivers put together and at no extra cost to the government;
4. It will boost government revenue on all fronts and;
5. It will cost government nothing but its coordinating office to execute, as the knowledge growth driver has the inherent capacity to generate more than enough resources for its full implementation from the dormant capacities of the economy.

Thus, the new agenda is a win-win situation for everyone with absolutely no disadvantage whatsoever. Although all governments had called for and desired this new agenda, they cannot adopt it unless it is supported by elite consensus, and that is ultimately what this intervention seeks to mobilize.       

We thank you in advance for throwing your weight behind this historic intervention.