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Tag: Okonjo Iweala

  • Okonjo-Iweala’s mealy-mouthed Tinubu economic performance scorecard – By Alade Rotimi-John

    Okonjo-Iweala’s mealy-mouthed Tinubu economic performance scorecard – By Alade Rotimi-John

    Nigerian-Born Director-General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, came calling the other week. She paid a courtesy call on President Bola Tinubu and gave what should have been an austere and severe personal assessment of Nigeria’s economic performance under the Tinubu administration.  An otherwise closely-reasoned television interview of Okonjo-Iweala after the Aso Rock Villa visit has sparked considerable interest and enthusiasm.

    Many have adjudged the Director-General to have spoken indistinctly or without clear articulation. The truthful analysis or assessment of the performance of the economic reform programme of the government is timidly advised to be avoided like a rattle snake because of the hypersensitivity of government and the hyena-like wildness of its lapdogs respecting the subject matter.

    A free-minded discussant is pigeonholed as belonging to or being used by the opposition. An afore-held official prejudice is wont to destroy the chances of a clear reception of his thoroughly-researched or forthright analysis and prescription. The concerted hostility of hired online Turks and of rabid government supporters has proved difficult to overcome. The social media hirelings have been brimming with false confidence in the light of a perceived huge endorsement of the grim reform measures of the government.

    Okonjo-Iweala, on her part, has described the Nigerian economy as “stable” even under the challenging circumstances of the weak-kneed operational methodology of its captain. In a mechanistic sense, stability will seem to suggest a situation that is resistant to change. In economics discourse, when an economy is identified as stable, it is meant that the economy has reached a point where it has ceased to experience major or fundamental gridlock.

    In the wake of the 1981/82 Shagari-era economic downturn, the Federal government’s  Chief Economic Adviser, Professor Emmanuel Edozien, while responding to criticisms regarding the gaping difference between the lived realities of the people and the officially-alleged good performance of the economy, amused a beleaguered nation when he retorted that “the Economy is resilient.” Was that the question asked of him?

    A red herring is conjured when a public officer is confronted with difficult questions which require immediate direct answers. A misleading answer intended to divert attention from the real issue is offered nervously.

    Dr Okonjo-Iweala may have suffered a nervous dread as she reacted sympathetically to the official plea for public understanding of the government’s reform measures. The government, she explained, has achieved the stability of the economy. But her explanation was a decoy intended to lull the people to sleep. In it, she lured public attention away from the people’s existential problems.

    Some ominous rumblings have since ensued. Many commentators have deplored what they think is Mrs Okonjo-Iweala’s lack of commitment to the public cause respecting the alleviation of the pervasive excruciatingly harsh living conditions of the Nigerian people under the hurtful reform programme of President Tinubu’s government. Okonjo-Iweala who is generally considered an interesting personality in public life; who is endearing to one and all as a public officer of marked ability and as a well-trained public finance apparatchik is deemed to have goofed big time in this poor attempt to balance certain niceness of Diplomatic bearing or of the exquisite class with the rough and tumble of politics.

    Even as the stability of an economy is proclaimed as not necessarily precluding the hardship and suffering that are attendant to such “stability”, the purpose of that stability remains dubious. In an identified situation where inflation is reported to have fallen from 25 per cent to 12 per cent and prices of goods and services are still sky-high, the advantage of the putative stability is of negative value. One would expect from Okonjo-Iweala’s cold comfort regarding the attainment by the Tinubu administration of a stable economy, a real surge of hope for the people exemplified in a tumbling or affordable price regime with respect, for instance, to basic food items. It may well be that the Director-General chose her use of the word “stable” decidedly or with some deviously diplomatic purpose in mind.

    Cost of living is rooftop, to the chagrin of the people. Food, housing, transportation, health care, etc are generally out of reach of the teeming masses even as incomes are abysmally low. We are informed that economic stability does not preclude hardship or that it does not suggest that the socio-economic conditions of the people have improved.

    We have been educated that stability can coexist with hardship and privation. Our eggheads have divined that it could take months or even years before stability could successfully grapple with hardship to translate into job creation, higher wages, cheaper goods or some beneficial indices of socio-economic welfare, etc. They even insist that the state of stability must hold long enough even as pain becomes more grim and real. Further, our economic gurus predict the possibility of the stability phase reversing itself midway thereby prolonging the hardship or socially-unambient situation.

    Even as the most important singular purpose of government remains the security and welfare of the people otherwise expressed as the greatest good of the greatest number of the people, a stable economic situation as propounded by the Okonjo-Iweala school of economic growth and development will seem to defeat the terms of the people’s social contract. This school hypothesises that a socio-economic welfare milieu can only be preceded by a prerequisite “stable economy” in which suffering, hardship, privation, etc must be endured ad nauseum.

    The Tinubu presidency reform measures which Okonjo-Iweala applauded at her visit are no more than the casual, incoherent, unintelligible, one-cap-fits-all propositions that offer no immediate succour and are positioned to delay or postpone the welfare of the ordinary people. The Nigerian educated elite cannot absolve itself from being complicit in all that has bedevilled the country. In fact, it is actively partaking, collaborating or is complacently indifferent to the deterioration of the Nigerian socio-economic and political environment without any passionate opposition and struggle.

    The membership of the Nigerian elite class continues to pander to the whims of those in authority and thereby finds it difficult to pronounce truth to power even as the pervading situation requires that government be made conscious to respond to the needs and wishes of the people. Felicitous allusions to matters of grave existential conditions are all that have unfortunately come from otherwise enlightened self-interest.

    Perhaps no final word may be said about the duplicity of our eggheads from who so much was expected and upon who so much pathos has been expended. Concrete economic, political and social achievements have been fortuitously wasted on the altar of elite indocility. Our trust, our hope or confidence may have been wrongly placed. Unfortunately, it cannot be doubted that socio-political and economic kinesis can only be engineered or led by elite leadership.

    ong ago in 1982, Chief Obafemi Awolowo identified a great impediment to our national growth and development. Ruminated clear-eyed Awo: “… the agglomeration of obtuse, supine and unawakened minds that are responsible for this criminal neglect want to continue – indeed, perpetuate themselves in office.”

  • Okonjo-Iweala: Saleswoman of bad products – By Owei Lakemfa

    Okonjo-Iweala: Saleswoman of bad products – By Owei Lakemfa

    The Nigerian-born, American Director General of the World Trade Organisation, WTO, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, visited her old country on August 14, 2025.

    A consummate politician, she told the Bola Tinubu administration what it loves to hear: that it is doing quite well. She told the suffering population what they know: that they are suffering. She then presented an ancient solution: social safety net. This is like applying anaesthetics rather than treat a wound. For this, social media eunuchs praised her as an “expert”. She smiled at all, and returned to her home.

    When Okonjo-Iweala at the Presidential Villa had said: “We think that the President and his team have worked hard to stabilise the economy…So the reforms have been in the right direction”, the Presidency was quite pleased. It  appeared a neutral party had  given an expert advice that its reforms are effective. However, for millions, these are not reforms but poverty-inducing deformities. But who else will the fly ally with, but the man with open sores?

    The Tinubu ‘reforms’ are the same Okonjo Iweala carried when she was  Finance Minister and Co-ordinating Minister of the Economy under the Obasanjo and Jonathan administrations. These are the same reforms which at its inception ten years ago, the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, characterised as the “PDP sixteen years  of waste.” So, I won’t take, seriously,  persons who think her endorsement  is a watershed.

    Indeed, the Tinubu reforms have led to a hundred per-cent devaluation of the local currency in an import-dependent economy. The result is mass poverty. The reforms include 400 per cent increase in fuel prices which has led to prohibitive transport costs so much that the cost of transporting food to the urban centres across the country is more than the cost of production. Factories continue to close, foreign loans  multiply, and hunger prances across the land like an armed bandit taking hostages.

    There were 118 million children out-of-school when President Muhammadu Buhari handed over power to President Tinubu. This has not reduced.

    It is true that with the so-called removal of fuel subsidy, the Federal, State and Local Governments receive higher monthly allocations. But it is like giving more bananas to a monkey. Essentially, the poor is  being robbed to further enrich the ruling elites.

    So, the Tinubu administration needs to listen less to people like Okonjo-Iweala and more to the people whose stomachs are rumbling for lack of food.

    Okonjo-Iweala had also said: “We need to put in social safety nets so that people who are feeling the pinch of the reforms can also have some support to be able to weather the hardship. So that’s the next step.”

    Wrong Ma, that is not the “next step”. That step has been endlessly taken for centuries. Social safety net, as an informal support system, has been in place since ancient times and is an integral part of the Nigerian culture.

    The structured social safety net has also been in place for centuries. When the West imposed crippling structural adjustment programmes on over 30 African countries between 1986 and 1992, it was so-called social safety net that was introduced supposedly to cushion the effects. The military regimes between 1986 and 1999 had a plethora of these deceitful safety net programmes. Okonjo-Iweala, as Minister,  implemented some of them under the Obasanjo administration. One of such was called the Poverty Alleviation Programme, PAP. She also did under the Jonathan administration, one of which was called SURE-P.  Social net safety is the cash transfer under the APC governments. So,  she is merely suggesting the old programmes that have repeatedly failed, rather than  pro-people programmes based on Chapter Two of the Nigerian Constitution.

    But I am not surprised because she has played these same games times over. In any case, that was how she became the DG of the WTO. Let me refresh our memories. The Europeans have cornered the International Monetary Fund, IMF, to the extent that only Europeans can lead it. On the other hand,  the US owns the World Bank to such degree that only an American citizen appointed by the US President can become its President. The rest of the world had only the WTO leadership open for contest.

    Nigeria decided to contest for that position in the 2019 election. We had a very good candidate in Dr. Yonov Frederick Agah who was then the  WTO Deputy Director General. Other candidates from Africa were  Eloi Laourou of Benin Republic and Egypt’s Abdulhammed Mamdouh. The African Union, AU,  decided to streamline the African candidates in order to ensure victory. Nigeria got the nod.

    But after this endorsement of  Dr Agah, Okonjo-Iweala worked in the shadows, and before we understood  the intrigues, President Buhari had been manipulated into believing that Nigeria’s best chance was Okonjo-Iweala, so he switched our candidate for her. But Nigeria and, indeed, Africa did not realise it was being manipulated. It turned out that Okonjo-Iweala had actually switched nationality to the US.  So, the US ended up leading both the World Bank and WTO!

    Okonjo-Iweala has done such a wonderful job for her bosses that her second term from September 1, 2025, is assured. But in reality, the WTO under her is mercifully, on life-support.

    The WTO had been established in 1995  as a forum for trade  negotiations, to provide  a framework,  structure  trade agreement, administer them,  reduce trade barriers and settle trade disputes.  Also, the WTO was used as an instrument to force down the throats of weak nations capsules like the  drastic reduction in social spending, privatisation, so-called market-determined exchange rate and  deregulation.

    But Okonjo-Iweala’s home country of US under President Donald Trump, has taken over the duties of the WTO. It has also transformed its White House into the court for settlement of international trade disputes.

    Therefore, when  on April 25, 2025, Okonjo-Iweala   described  the WTO at its  30th Anniversary “ as a bedrock of predictability in the global economy – and as a platform for dialogue and cooperation on trade.” she was being economical with the truth.

    But were the WTO to collapse, there will not be much tears for it because  it is one of the most iniquitous international institutions in history.

    When HIV/AIDS ravaged humanity and there were generic drugs that could be cheaply produced, it was the WTO that blocked the process. As a result, victims that could have been saved died like flies. It took the courage and will of people like Nelson Mandela to call off the WTO bluff. Despite threats of severe sanctions by the Western-backed WTO, countries like India and South Africa went ahead to produce the life-saving drugs. The result was that the drugs became so cheap that in many countries, including Nigeria, they are offered free.

  • Hunger: Okonjo-Iweala Calls For Social Safety for the poor after meeting with Tinubu

    Hunger: Okonjo-Iweala Calls For Social Safety for the poor after meeting with Tinubu

    The Director General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has called on the Federal Government to put social safety nets in place for poor Nigerians who are feeling the pains of President Bola Tinubu’s economic reforms.

    Okonjo-Iweala stated this on Thursday after a meeting with the president at the Aso Villa in Abuja.

    Though she commended the president for the economic reforms including petrol subsidy removal and the unification of the foreign exchange windows, the former Nigerian finance minister said the government must put social safety nets in place for poor Nigerians to cope with the economic hardship occasioned by the government’s reforms.

    A vendor counts her money as a girl looks on at the Lokoja International Market in Lokoja on October 21, 2024.

    In a chat with newsmen after she met with the president, the WTO boss said, “We think that the President and his team have worked hard to stabilize the economy. You cannot really improve an economy unless it is stable. So, he has to be given the credit for the stability of the economy. The reforms have been in the right direction.

    “What is needed next is growth; we now need to grow the economy and we need to put in social safety nets so that people who are feeling the pinch of the reforms can also have some support to weather the hardship. That’s the next step.”

    Tinubu, who launched a string of economic reforms when he assumed office in May 2023, has come under heavy criticism in over two years, as many Nigerians have attributed soaring food inflation and skyrocketing cost of living to his removal of petrol subsidy and the unification of foreign exchange windows.

    Angry citizens have held a number of rallies to protest the hardship faced by the middle class and ordinary citizens in the last two years, the most prominent of them being the hunger protests or #EndBadGovernance demonstrations of August 2024.

    The Nigerian president’s meeting with Okonjo-Iweala took place two weeks before the expiration of her first term as WTO Director-General on August 31, 2025, and the commencement of her second term on September 1, 2025.

    The renowned development economist and global finance expert made history in 2021 as the first African and first woman to lead the 164-nation-member WTO.

    The WTO chief, accompanied by Trade Minister Jumoke Oduwole, also briefed the president on the progress made on the Women’s Exporters’ Fund for the digital economy.

    Okonjo-Iweala said, “We came to brief him about something very joyful that we did today with the help of the first lady.

    “We launched a Women’s Exporters’ Fund for the digital economy. This is a fund that is jointly managed by the World Trade Organisation and the International Trade Centre and supports women to weather the storms of the economy and create jobs for themselves.

    “It is part of the thinking of the social safety net and what we can do to support Nigerian women to contribute more to the economy and themselves.

    “Nigeria competed and one one of four countries that won globally to be part of this initiative.

    “We have 67,000 Nigerian women who applied for this, and 146 of them won, and they are going to have money disbursed directly to them.

    “16 of them won what we called the Booster Track; those who already have businesses, but their businesses would be scaled up. They would receive technical and business support from the WTO and the ITC for 18 months.

    “Another 100 would get $5,000 each to start and strengthen their businesses, with 12-month reforms.”

  • Trump’s tariffs will have minimal impact on Africa – Okonjo-Iweala

    Trump’s tariffs will have minimal impact on Africa – Okonjo-Iweala

    The Director-General (D-G) of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, stated that Africa would be minimally impacted by the tariffs imposed by the United States of America (USA).

    Okonjo-Iweala made the remark during an interview with Nigerian journalists at the Spring Meetings of the World Bank in Washington D.C. on Friday.

    She explained that only 6.5 per cent of Africa’s exports go to the USA, while 4.4 per cent of its imports come from the U.S., meaning that the impact on the continent would be minimal.

    “The trade of the continent is very limited with the USA. We have done the analysis, and the impact on the continent as a whole is not significant,” she said.

    However, she noted that Africa’s limited trade with the USA was also not ideal, as it hindered economic growth.

    The D-G emphasised that Africa needed to focus on utilising its own resources to reach its full potential, as aid was declining, and the continent required more investment.

    She pointed out that Africa must strengthen internal trade, citing Lesotho as an example.

    In spite of Lesotho exporting 200 million dollars’ worth of textiles to the USA, the country faced challenges due to the shrinking U.S. market.

    Okonjo-Iweala noted that Africa spent 7 billion dollars  annually on importing textiles, suggesting that Lesotho should instead focus on selling textiles within African markets.

    She also urged the USA to consider the effects of tariffs on least-developed countries, calling for a reassessment of the reciprocal tariffs in poorer nations.

    Okonjo-Iweala concluded that Africa needed more investments and should work towards boosting intra-Africa trade, which remained underdeveloped.

    “We cannot trade more externally, where our trade is only 3 per cent of world trade, or internally, where intra-Africa trade is 16 to 20 per cent at most,” she said.

  • Security has been weaponised in our country for political purposes – Okonjo-Iweala

    Security has been weaponised in our country for political purposes – Okonjo-Iweala

    The Director-General of the World Trade Organization, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has slammed Nigerian politicial leaders for weaponizing security for political purposes.

    Okonjo-Iweala while delivering a keynote address entitled, ‘A Social Contract For Nigeria’s Future’ at the Eko Hotel & Suites in Lagos during the opening ceremony of the 2024 Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) on Sunday argued that it is impossible to have socioeconomic development without security.

    The former Nigerian finance minister said, “We cannot have socio-economic development without security. We certainly cannot have security without development.

    “We all know that security has been weaponised in our country for political purposes by political actors, leading partly to the situation we have now.

    “We have politicians who believe that the best way to make their opponents look bad is to instigate insecurity making it look like they can’t govern, regardless of whether this leads to loss of lives and property of innocent Nigerians. This has to stop.”

    The WTO boss noted that there’s enough technological innovations to track crude oil theft and bring those behind the act to justice in Nigeria, adding that those responsible for stopping the “intolerable” action of crude oil theft no longer have excuses.

  • WTO: 58 member countries support Nigeria’s Okonjo-Iweala for second term in office

    WTO: 58 member countries support Nigeria’s Okonjo-Iweala for second term in office

    About 58 countries of the 164 member states of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) members have voiced support for a proposal from the African Group backing incumbent Director General, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, to serve a second term.

    These 58 countries of the trade association made this known at a July 22 meeting of the WTO General Council, according to a statement by the world trade body.

    “The African Group requests that the current Director-General make herself available to serve a second term, and has proposed that the process of reappointing the Director-General should be started as soon as possible,” the statement partly read.

    “Fifty-eight members, several speaking on behalf of groups of members, took the floor to comment and express their support for the African Group proposal. They called on DG Okonjo-Iweala to make her intentions regarding a second term known as soon as possible. Most of these members praised the DG’s hard work and her achievements during her first term.

    Okonjo-Iweala, 70, said she was very grateful for the support from members. “Everything that I’ve accomplished, we’ve accomplished together,” she said.

    However, Okonjo Iweala noted that although she’s grateful for the support she would get back to members very soon regarding her intentions.

    Okonjo-Iweala, the seventh WTO boss, took office on March 1, 2021 for a single term of four years which will expire on August 31, 2025. She is eligible for a second term.

    The former Nigerian Finance Minister navigated stiff opposition to become the first woman and the first African to serve as WTO Director-General. Before her current appointment, she twice served as Nigeria’s Finance Minister from 2003 to 2006 and from 2011 to 2015. She also briefly acted as Foreign Minister in 2006, the first woman to hold both positions.

    The skilled negotiator had a 25-year career at the World Bank as a development economist, rising to the number two position of Managing Director, Operations.

  • Okonjo-Iweala excited over flower ‘baptism’ on 70th birthday [Photos]

    Okonjo-Iweala excited over flower ‘baptism’ on 70th birthday [Photos]

    Director-general of World Trade Organization (WTO) Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has taken to social media to express gratitude after being gifted bouquets of flowers from all over the world to celebrate her 70th birthday.

    TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports that Okonjo-Iweala, Nigeria’s former minister of finance and coordinating minister of the economy, turned 70 on Thursday.

    Taking to the microblogging platform, X formerly Twitter, Iweala shared photos of the flowers, adding that she had never received this number of flowers before.

    The Nigerian-American economist described it as one of the happiest days of her life.

    “I don’t normally do personal tweets, but today is an exception! It has been one of the happiest days of my life – my 70th birthday! So much outpouring of love from everywhere!! I want to thank all WTO Ambassadors, WTO staff, friends and family!

    “I’ve never received so many bouquets of flowers from all over the world, as I have today! Along with good wishes and prayers. I consider myself blessed to have a loving husband, family, friends and well wishers! All Glory and Thanks to God!” She wrote.

    See photos below;

    Okonjo-Iweala, also Nigeria’s former minister of foreign affairs, is the first woman and the first African to lead WTO.

    She assumed office on March 1, 2021.

  • WTO DG, Okonjo-Iweala, US aviation authorities speak on plane crash, Wigwe’s death

    WTO DG, Okonjo-Iweala, US aviation authorities speak on plane crash, Wigwe’s death

    The CEO of Access Bank Holdings, along with his wife and son, were among six people killed in a helicopter crash in the Mojave Desert near the California-Nevada border late Friday night, according to a World Trade Organization official.

    Access Bank chief executive Herbert Wigwe, his wife and son, and the former group chairman of the Nigeria Stock Exchange, Abimbola Ogunbanjo, died in the crash, WTO Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said in a post on X. Both of the helicopter’s pilots were also killed, according to authorities.

    The chartered Airbus EC130 helicopter was flying from Palm Springs, California, to Boulder City, Nevada, just outside of Las Vegas, according to National Transportation Safety Board member Michael Graham.

    The aircraft, which was operated by California-based charter company Orbic Air, took off around 8:45 p.m. PT and crashed just after 10 p.m. near Interstate 15 in Halloran Springs, California, Graham said.

    The helicopter caught fire upon impact, Graham added, citing witness reports. Witnesses also reported rain and a wintry mix when the crash happened, he said.

    The NTSB is investigating the cause of the crash and was on the scene in Halloran Springs, California, Saturday night collecting evidence, Graham said at a news conference.

    Authorities have yet to publicly identify the people killed but condolences have began pouring in for the Wigwe family and Ogunbanjo.

    The governor of Nigeria’s Edo State, Godwin Obaseki, said he is “extremely shocked and devastated” and said the deaths are an “irreparable loss.”

    “Wigwe was a colossus in Nigeria’s financial sector, leading Access Bank to become an international brand that placed Nigeria on the global map of first-class financial services,” Obaseki said in a post on X.

    Wigwe became the Group Managing Director and chief executive of Access Bank in 2014, according to the company’s website. CNN has reached out to the bank for comment.

    Investigators will return to the crash scene Sunday to continue documenting the site, including using a drone to create an aerial map of the wreckage, Graham said. He requested anyone who witnessed the crash contact the NTSB and provide any available photos or video of the incident.

    “The identities of the deceased will be released once positive identification has been made and next of kin notifications have been made,” the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department said Saturday.

    A preliminary investigation report will be released in the coming weeks, but the full inquiry could take as long as two years before a final report is published, according to Graham. (Text excluding headline: CNN)

  • Nigeria’s Okonjo Iweala emerges Africa’s most powerful woman

    Nigeria’s Okonjo Iweala emerges Africa’s most powerful woman

    The Director-General of the World Trade Organisation, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has emerged Africa’s most powerful woman according to Forbes.

    Inside Forbes’ 20th annual ranking released on Tuesday, Okonjo-Iweala, a prominent Nigerian, is positioned at 87th place in the Most Powerful Women in the World list, surpassing Mpumi Madisa, a South African businesswoman at 88th.

    Tanzanian President, Samia Hassan also joined the list at the 93rd spot and Nigerian media mogul and philanthropist, Mo Abudu at 98th.

    Okonjo-Iweala, who shattered barriers in 2021 as the first woman and the first African Director-General of the WTO, is celebrated for her remarkable career at the World Bank and impactful economic reforms in Nigeria.

    Her recognition on Forbes’ list underscores not only her significant contributions to global trade but also her commitment to economic development, governance, and international leadership.

  • Tinubu, Okonjo-Iweala meet at presidential villa

    Tinubu, Okonjo-Iweala meet at presidential villa

    President Bola Tinubu is currently meeting with Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the Director General of the World Trade Organisation, WTO, at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

    Okonjo-Iweala arrived at the Presidential Villa alongside the former Minister of State for Health, Dr. Ali Pate at about 2:50pm on Tuesday.

    The purpose of the meeting is not yet known as of press time.

    Recall that Okonjo-Iweala had earlier in June met with Tinubu when they both attended the leadership summit held in Paris, France.

    Okonjo-Iweala was the Minister of Finance during the former president Good luck Jonathan’s government.