Mr Godwin Emefiele is one of Nigeria's finest bankers, having graduated in 1984 with a B.Sc and MBA in Finance in 1986 from the University of Nigeria Nsukka. Emefiele has more than eighteen years banking experience, having
started as a Finance lecturer at his alumni University, before embarking on a banking career that took him to the very heights of the corporate world. He has also held several prestigious banking posts which include Corporate Banking Executive Managing Director, Deputy Managing Director , Chief Executive Officer and Group Managing Director all in Zenith Bank.
It was based on these records and experience that no uproar was heard when he was appointed the new Central Bank Governor on June 3 2014 by then President Goodluck Jonathan to replace Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanushi (present Emir of Kano) after he was sent on a compulsory gardening leave for raising alarm over unremitted $20 billion crude oil sales by the NNPC. If Sanusi was seen as a destroyer, publicist and attention seeker , Emefiele was the reverse as he preferred to work behind the scene and in a meticulous and creative manner. He was portrayed as one highly skilled in fiscal and monetary aspects of the economy and as one who understood the macroeconomic and microeconomic variables of the economy . By appointing Emefiele, the then government was not criticised for encouraging corruption after it refuted all the allegations raised by Sanusi and instead of investigating hestily sacked him.
Fast forward to March 2016, under two different administrations with two different macroeconomic and microeconomic visions and doctrines yet it seems Emefiele has lost it. In an honest assessment, Emefiele has struggle to impress and is presently pulling the strings at a time the country's economy seems to be regressing at a very fast rate. Though he could be excused due to the fact that crude oil prices have dropped astronomically, yet history shows he did not fare better while oil prices were on a record high in the past administration . While his boss (the president) is taking all the criticisms and banters, no one seems to care or notice the very grievous sins of Emefiele which are so numerous to be mentioned.
Under Emefiele the country's poverty rate has risen from 60 per cent to 71 per cent with more than 100 million Nigerians living below the $2 poverty cap and with no signs of slowing down . Inflation isn't to be ignored as it has also increased from 7 per cent in 2013 to 11 per cent presently , this is in direct contrast to the 7 per cent Sanusi left it after reducing it from 15 per cent when he was appointed in 2007. Unemployment is another problem as it has soared to 24 per cent at a period more than three million beverage and tobacco workers are preparing to be laid off, small and medium enterprises struggling to keep up and foreign firms relocating to other smaller less sophisticated West African countries due to foreign exchange problems .
It is also important to remember the ongoing reports that under him as the CBN Governor that the CBN recruited more than 147 workers with little or no due process followed . What this means is that 147 people gained employment into a federal government establishment which he heads through the back door at a time there is an urgent call for the country to return to the era of due process. This is not forgetting that he was the one who released the now infamous $2 billion to Sambo Dasuki which was diverted . While he has not been indicted or mentioned in the on going trial, it is natural to ask the role he played in the entire ugly incidence.
At a time this administration is claiming to champion the cause for due process and anti corruption , it is only natural that Godwin Emefiele takes his bow to allow a fresh head to undo the harm he has caused the economy in his short spell in charge . Anything other than that might seem a furtile effort on the part of the government to turn around the nearly collapsed economy .
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