WHY NIGERIA IS NOT AS RICH AS YOU (MAY) THINK...

One thing I’ve heard over and over and over is that Nigeria is a rich country and our leaders are stealing all the “money”…the looting part is probably true as the World Bank has estimated that as a result of corruption 80 percent of energy revenues benefit only 1 percent of the population. However, crude oil revenues (which account for the main source of foreign exchange for the country and a large chunk of the GDP) is actually small for the humongous size of the population.

Here’s a table showing the oil exporting quotas of OPEC countries and their population.

OPEC Country	Population approx. (millions)	Crude Oil Export (millions of barrels/day)	GDP per capita (US $)
Nigeria	150	2.0	$1,370
Angola	18	1.8	$1,940
Saudi Arabia	25	8.0	$18,600
Venezuela	28	2.2	$11,200
Equatorial Guinea	0.7	0.4	$27,100
Qatar	1.3	1.2	$89,000
United Arab Emirates	4.5	2.3	$64,000

Facts don’t lie…Data is irrefutable…It is clear that Nigeria is not as “rich” as many people think. There is potential for wealth in the nation given the rich human resources but this is also the bane of our development as there are too many people eating from “the same cake”.

A few insights can also be gleaned from this data.

1. Firstly, Nigeria needs to deal with her population. The population virtually doubled within two decades based on National Census figures. This is clearly unsustainable. Many children are out of school and without access to basic education and many don’t have access to health care. The population’s burden for these facilities and if nothing is done about population control, it will overwhelm the country in the next decade.

2. Nigeria urgently needs to diversify the economy. Much has been said about solid minerals, tourism, manufacturing, etc. Now, we need action. Clearly, crude oil proceeds are not sufficient to fund the economy (unlike smaller countries like Equatorial Guinea who can do with oil alone).

3. We can now see how Qatar, a country of 1.3 million people can afford to host the World Cup ALONE in air-conditioned stadia…too much money…looking for how to spend…

Even though the "rich" mythology is disproved, I believe the best is yet to come for Nigeria...I'm looking forward to the greatness we're hoping for, but the work needs to be done NOW...