Thread by @adamugarba

I noticed many people believed that the exit of @HSBC & @UBS from Nigeria is because of the effectiveness of the ongoing war on corruption. It's not true, do not be deceived. Their exit from our country is not a good pointer to the confidence in our economy.

Here is why

Thread.

Since the collapse of the European empires, England, France, Germany, Spain & Portugal etc after the second world war due to their utter destruction, the empires started the to break up because the stress upon them is no longer bearable. Most overseas territories must be ceded.

The only standing power, with resources, military, and money is the U.S. Europe need to rebuild its infrastructure and institutions. So a meeting was convened at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire for a Monetary and Financial Conference. The U.S wanted to help Europe rebuild.

At that moment, The U.S controlled 2/3 of the global Gold reserve and therefore, propose that the new Bretton woods systems rest on the Gold and Dollar. That was the beginning of adopting the dollar as the international currency for business exchange.

This accelerated the ceding of overseas empires which grants so many countries independence, including Nigeria. Since then, the dollar became the barometer of Global investment. All the countries were founded on this great principle, including Nigeria, as a country.

Thus, the more the country the attract the dollar the more develop the country will be, the less dollar the country attract, the less developed the country. The degree of the global interconnectedness is so much that no country can survive in isolation without enough dollars.

As the dollar became the global barometer for investments in countries, the gateway to manage the flow of such valuable current is multinational banks. Banks like @HSBC @UBS etc. Their presence in an economy determines the confidence of the dollar inflow to that economy.

When these kinds of banks are shutting down business in your country, trust me, you are in a long way of economic isolation. Countries do everything possible to prevent that, including giving up nuclear weapons, like #Iran have done, just to make sure they have access to dollars.

The #IranSanctions reintroduced by the US today is just to block them access to the financial network, notably the dollars. Hence, they can't trade with/to other nations in volumes. However, in Nigeria, we seem to be doing this ourselves, and some people ignorantly celebrate it.

Lack of enough dollar will put enormous pressure on the Naira which will inevitably give rise to inflation that will, in turn, make life more difficult to the common man. If we continue this trend, trust me, the poverty we have witnessed in the country is just the beginning.

Some will say, "why not shutdown dollar network & continue to use our Naira, make everything ourselves, buy & sell to ourselves etc" My answer is: Review the China policy before Deng Xiaoping opened their economy in 1978 or we simply ask our neighbor, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe.

Others will say, "banks like @HSBC & @UBS are in Nigeria to manage corrupt illicit funds" My answer to them is, these are process oriented & transparent global financial institutions. Both the two banks are managing asset worth over $2 Trillion. That is twice Nigeria's entire GDP

I read someone says, "We don't even know they exist in Nigeria, what’s our business with them, we don't need them" My answer to this is: They are here to manage assets of the multinationals like Mobil, Shell, Chevron etc, the companies that give Nigeria money we get from Oil.

I personally believe the President is sincere & want to do the right thing. But I am not sure if his economic team is advising him properly on the way to grow the Nigerian economy. Any way you look at it, this is a bad pointer to our country's economic rise, we must address it

We should not keep politicizing everything. One of our biggest problem which we must work on is pride & emotion. The time for these is over. Let's accept our position as a third world country, open our economy to global trade & agree to keep reasonable international treaties.

May God continue to bless Nigeria, its people, and grants wisdom & guidance to our leaders so that they can be illuminated to lead the country to prosperity & peace. May our leaders be blessed with a spirit that enables them to see Nigeria's importance beyond politics. Thank you.