Arunma Oteh began her presentation titled REFLECTIONS by appreciating the Convener and host of The Platform, who afforded her the opportunity to share what was heavy on her heart.

Her first perception of the country was summed up in the phrase “abundant poverty”. She justified this thought by citing that on the World Economic Forum competitiveness index for 2019, corruption perception index Nigeria ranked low.

She went further to state other facts about the nation: 19 million Nigerians live on less than $1 a day, none of the Nigerian Universities is among the top hundred universities in the world, 31% of Nigerians don’t have access to clean water, 58% of Nigerians don’t have access to sanitation services, 80 million Nigerians don’t have access to grid, electricity, and that the nation has a problem with security. According to her, our governance is weak and our politics is killing us.

Furthermore, she mentioned that we have poor public financial management, difficult policy, legal and regulatory environments. In her opinion, the biggest challenge in Nigeria is corruption. She buttressed that by stating that from 1960 to 2009, at least $20 trillion has been stolen from the pockets of the Nigerian treasury despite the nation being in huge debt.

In the midst of these bleak realizations came a silver lining as she added that despite these challenges that Nigeria as a country was great and she had not lost hope in it and its citizens. “This is a nation of abundance”, she affirmed. She pointed out Nigeria’s diverse endowments, which includes diverse agricultural produce, Solid Minerals located in all parts of the nation and the hardworking and resilient 206 million Nigerians.

She stressed that empowering the youth and women will help in decreasing poverty levels. She likened Nigeria to Wakanda, the fictional country in the movie “Black Panther”. She said that to achieve this kind of utopian country Nigeria and Nigerians alike must;

• Focus on integrity,
• Focus on discipline,
• Have empathy and love for each other,
• Have respect, transparency, ability and leadership at all levels.
• Have financially literate citizens.
• Mobilize domestic resources, institutional and retail.
• Have an ecosystem that matches the enterprising nature of Nigerians
• Venture capital must flourish.
• Have instant medium to long term capital.
• Have a vibrant market,
• Treat education as a human right, and all children poor and rich should have equal access to the best education,
• Focus education on science, technology, engineering and math, and entrepreneurial skills.
• Arm ourselves with Technology and innovation, the plant industry.

She ended her presentation on the note that for Nigeria to work every Nigerian must have their hands on deck.