Rituals of the United Nations

Unless President Bola Tinubu changes his mind, he will address the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Thursday.

If he does, Vice-President Shettima will deliver the national statement as he has done in the past two years.

Both men will be coming off a tell-tale September with Nigeria on auto-pilot: Mr Tinubu, on vacation in Europe, ignored the constitutional standard by refusing to transfer power to his deputy.

Premium Times reported that since taking office in 2023, Tinubu has never formally transferred power during an absence.

It is remarkable, then, that whichever Nigerian “leader” arrives at the head of the nation’s delegation will confront the interesting theme of the 81st United Nations: “Restoring trust, managing transformation: a United Nations that delivers for all.”

As a friend of the UN, I find this to be somewhat hilarious, particularly for delegations such as Nigeria. Trust? Transformation? Delivering for all, as in “all of the people”?

Ordinarily, this would not be a difficult subject. Elevating all the people is exactly what world leaders, 26 years ago in the same city, proclaimed the Millennium Declaration.

It served as the foundation of the Millennium Development Goals, which were intended to be achieved within 15 years.

At the end of that period, in 2015, Member States such as China, Brazil and Rwanda turned in remarkable success stories.

China, for instance, lifted over 500 million citizens out of poverty, reducing the extreme poverty rate in the country from 61% in 1990 down to just 4% when the MDGs wound down.

Not Nigeria, which met just one goal, achieving net universal primary school enrollment, but almost nothing else. Despite significant GDP growth during the Olusegun Obasanjo years, poverty did not disappear, and as many as five out of ten Nigerians still lived in extreme poverty.

By 2017, in the early days of the Sustainable Development Goals, Nigeria would become the poverty capital of the world. The commitment that Nigeria made in 2000 was not accompanied by the political energy.

President Muhammadu Buhari, speaking in 2015 as the SDGs were launched, sounded as if he would be different. He described the core objectives of poverty eradication and reducing inequalities of the SDGs as “precisely at the centre” of his administration’s agenda.

Among others, he said he would “tackle inequalities arising from massive unemployment and previous government policies favouring a few people to the detriment of the many.”

In real life, he lacked such commitment.

Buhari would of course also be remembered for his June 2019 announcement of a plan to lift 100 million Nigerians out of poverty in 10 years, affirming that “with leadership and a sense of purpose,” it could be accomplished.

“China and Indonesia succeeded under authoritarian regimes,” he declared. “India succeeded in a democratic setting. We can do it.”

It was a ruse. A thoroughly lazy and insincere leader, he went to bed after the exertions of making the speech, waking up two years later to claim that he had already lifted 10.5 people out.

Buhari also ignored the SDGs. In fact, in his final address to the General Assembly, he mentioned them not even once, which was both a fact and a warning.

That brings us to the present, where Mr Tinubu, advertised three months ago as having “generously agreed” to attend, will be expected to pronounce on the efforts of his government to boost democracy and development.

Like his predecessor, Mr Tinubu does not acknowledge the SDGs in public. At his 2023 appearance at the General Assembly, he would only say, “We seek enhanced international cooperation with African nations to achieve the 2030 agenda” and the SDGs.

Vice-President Shettima followed that lead in 2024 when he spoke of most developing nations being significantly behind on the Goals “largely due to a lack of resources available to finance their implementation.”

Last year, he did not breathe a word about whether Nigeria was breaking a sweat. But 2026 is a wonderful opportunity to let the world know that Nigeria does believe in democracy and development. Especially as many can follow every Tinubu government declaration of triumph, called “Together We Can Do It,” as livestreamed by the United Nations.

There will be many opportunities for Nigeria to brag about what it has achieved anywhere in the 17 interconnected goals. Already, last Thursday, the Secretary-General convened the annual SDG Moment to showcase inspiring stories of transformation in communities, countries, and regions.

The Nigerian delegation can show off our achievements at the SDG Media Zone, an excellent assemblage of world leaders, influencers, activists, experts, content creators and media partners highlighting activities and solutions in support of the SDGs. And The Goals Lounge brings together dialogue, partnerships and visibility towards accelerating progress.

The problem is who or what Nigerian leadership will show up and take advantage of these opportunities. Tinubu, who appears to be far more concerned about his personal problems, does not recognise any authority in Shettima.

During his vacation, it was his wife, Remi Tinubu, who is not an officer of the constitution, who launched a scheme called ‘The Household Prosperity and Empowerment Social Protection Project’.

The $1 billion social protection programme, which is, in effect, illegal, is allegedly designed to shift vulnerable Nigerians from temporary relief to lasting economic empowerment and self-reliance.

Ironically, it comes just as Nigerians await a response from the Tinubu government to an Auditor-General’s question of nearly N80bn in cash transfers to the vulnerable. Last week, I traced this pervasive Nigerian practice.

But this story: of a deformed, defective democracy, is what Nigeria seems set to avoid telling the UN this week. While it is unclear at the time of writing this story who will lead it, there seemed to be a battery of top officials set to make the New York trip.

Keep in mind that if just these officials do travel, hypothetically on a first-class basis and using Nigeria’s official estacode figures, the nation could spend up to N638 million for just a one-week trip on airfare and estacode alone; or N835 million if they spend two weeks. Those figures do not include hotels, if separately paid, airport transfers, protocol vehicles, security personnel, aides not listed by BusinessDay, communications, hospitality, excess baggage or the cost of Nigeria’s permanent mission in New York.

Keep in mind also that when the presidency travels, bulk purchases of foreign exchange are involved. Examples: when Tinubu prepared for the GA in 2023, four separate purchases, dated September 5, were made worth $4,000,000.

The following day, 6 September, four additional transactions totalling €1,200,000 were made. And when the Vice-President travelled to Switzerland on January 15, 2024, a purchase of $483,277,000, dated February 24, was made.

The point of the Millennium Declaration appears to have eluded us: if democracy works for all, it is an easy story to tell. Otherwise, it is the kind of farce Nigeria continues to be an example of.

And occasionally, history comes back to evaluate, as Kevin Abdulrahman of Executive Authority did last month of Buhari in 2015.

But it is time for the UN to ask the world whose interests its elaborate annual rituals in New York actually serve.