We need to be more nuanced in analyzing African government debt. Nigeria spending 9% of its GDP is by no means reckless. Problem is very little revenue to support that spending. So let’s focus on whether and how that spending is creating conditions necessary for growth.

https://twitter.com/StearsBusiness/status/1480811727130398722

Nigeria spends significantly less than most governments worldwide (not just compared to its peers).

@StearsBusiness - doublecheck your chart on government spending in the piece above. Ghana spends much more than 8% of its GDP.

Been wondering a lot lately just how valuable ubiquitous dichotomies like developed/developing or developed market (DM) vs emerging market (EM) actually are (esp as they have become a very popular analytical framework in the Covid era). These terms often conflate many different ideas/metrics, such that they take on different meanings to different people in different contexts. E.g. when we compare DMs to EMs, are we referring to the state of those countries’ financial markets OR their societies? Or both ?

It has been difficult for me to engage w/ largely dismissive criticisms of #Nigeria’s move to close its land borders with #Benin & #Niger to address rampant smuggling and #Benin’s systematic flouting of Ecowas trade protocols & other treaties signed w/ #Nigeria. But I feel this issue is too important not to try to improve public understanding about what’s at stake and why the status quo was untenable. So, what follows is a #thread about border security & rules-based trade, which is what the border closure is about at its core.

Why I say #Nigeria has a revenue crisis: The above graph tracks federal govt revenue (after “under recovery”), but also important to remember that a whole lot of revenue in #Nigeria is not available for federal use (due to state/LG allocations and whatnot).

Need to start holding these local actors responsible as well.

I’ve seen a lot of commentary to the effect that violence and inconclusive elections in the 2019 cycle is evidence that #Nigeria is witnessing a democratic regression. I understand this feeling, but strongly disagree. #NigeriaDecides #Thread This narrative is mostly driven by two factors: (1) the sense that 2015 was a watershed because an incumbent lost (this was a big deal!) and (2) the larger number of inconclusive elections in the 2019 cycle.

“To build a major project in the US now takes up to 10 years...Canada does it in two to three years and Germany does it in two.” Adebayo Ogunlesi of Global Infrastructure Partners (which owns Gatwick airport), referring to all the US regulatory hurdles projects have to clear. Part of the problem, he explains, is that in the US you often have multiple agencies doing the same thing. “For example, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers will, in some instances, both undertake environmental reviews.”