PRIVATIZATION OF PUBLIC ENTERPRISES AND THE WORKING CLASS IN NIGERIA
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PRIVATIZATION OF PUBLIC ENTERPRISES AND THE WORKING CLASS IN NIGERIA
ABSTRACT
The purpose of this work is to investigate the privatisation of public firms and its influence on Nigeria’s working class. It claims that privatisation has a negative impact on the Nigerian labour force and the impoverished. As a theoretical framework, Marxist political economy was used.
Privatisation of public businesses is nothing more than a capitalist and its ideologues’ political agenda. The information for this study was gathered from both primary and secondary sources.
Privatisation has increased poverty and unemployment, while education and health care have become a luxury for the Nigerian majority. Instead of this pathological emphasis on privatisation as the only solution to the country’s economic issues, it advocates pro-poor measures.
INTRODUCTION TO CHAPTER ONE
BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The state’s involvement in businesses in Nigeria extends back to the colonial era. Due to the lack of indigenous enterprises with the necessary cash for these capital-intensive projects, the colonial administration is tasked with providing infrastructural services such as railways, roads, bridges, water, electricity, and port facilities (Igbuzor 2003).
For much of the twentieth century, countries around the world (the Eastern Bloc) advocated private ownership of the means of production. A number of countries operated what was known as a mixed economy, which was characterised by a mix of public and private ownership of the means of production.
However, with the end of the cold war between the eastern and western blocs at the close of the twentieth century, private ownership of means of production assumed precedence.
Today, conventional opinion holds that the means of production are the only viable path to efficient production of goods and services, economic growth, and progress. As a result, there is a global push to privatise once-public firms.
Nigeria, like most developing countries, has established a sizable parastatal sector since independence in 1960 (particularly during the 1970s). The parastatal sector includes economic operations such as banking and insurance. Oil prospecting, exploration, refining and marketing cement, paper and steel mills, hotel and tourism, sugar estates, and so on.
According to a survey conducted by the Technical Committee on Privatisation and Commercialization (TCPC), there are nearly 600 public enterprises at the federal (National) level alone, with an additional 900 at the state (Regional) and local levels.
In Nigeria, an estimated 1,500 public firms contribute for 30-40% of fixed capital investments and the equivalent amount of formal sector employment.
The 1988 order was rescinded, and the Bureau for Public Enterprises (BEP) Act of 1993 was enacted to complete the full-scale privatisation. As a result of the political crisis and mass resistance, as well as the government’s loss of legitimacy, it became evident that the Babangida dictatorship could not complete the job.
The Abacha administration that followed did not have even a single day of popular support. This made it difficult for him to play any meaningful part in this area, and the ruling class realised that a new means of deception was required to complete their objective.
Obasanjo took office in 1999. The federal administration adopted the public enterprise (privatisation and commercialization) Act less than a month after taking office, establishing the national council on privatisation under the chairmanship of the Vice President. Mrs. Kojo, a World Bank chieftain, was forced to resign as a member of the executive committee.
All of this demonstrates the ruling class’s desperation to complete the plundering and destruction of the Nigerian people’s communal wealth.
According to civil society, privatisation has major welfare implications. Because of this, many ordinary people can no longer benefit from these services. Soyebo et al. (2001:31) “found a decrease in employment following privatisation.” On average, the number of employees at Okomu Oils dropped from 1000 to 993.4.”
“In Nigeria, privatisation came as an integral part of Adjustment credits and was aimed at improving the efficiency of government resource allocation,” Danjuma (2003: 1) writes. The primary goals are to reduce fiscal deficits, broaden the tax base, attract more investment, and expand the private sector.”
He attributes this critique to the purported negative consequences of privatisation on jobs and the poor, as well as perceptions of pervasive corruption in the privatisation process, particularly in developing countries.
We are interested in giving solutions to the following issues: privatisation of public firms and unemployment in Nigeria, as well as the ideological orientation that underpins the privatisation process.
The economic considerations, security concerns, and the ramifications of privatisation for the Nigerian working class are all discussed. Also discussed are the political and legal grounds for privatising public firms, as well as the reasons and motivations for privatising public enterprises in Nigeria.
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