This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 06 LAGOS 000147 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
PARIS FOR OECD 
 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ECON EFIN ETRD BEXP PGOV NI
SUBJECT:  The Economy in 2003:  Triumph of Politics 
 
 
¶1.  Summary. The economic outlook for the New Year is 
cloudy. Academic experts and business leaders fear that 
Nigeria will experience little if any real per capita 
growth in 2003. They bemoan Nigeria's OPEC oil 
production quota of 1.9 million barrels per day, which 
limits the country's potential oil exports. These 
experts fear even more what they say are irresponsible 
fiscal policies despite President Obasanjo's relative 
frugality. Central Bank data show that such policies 
are putting Nigeria on shaky economic ground as it 
heads toward 2003. Nigerian economists we have talked 
to do not expect a policy change during the next 
quarter, which will be the last before critical federal 
and state elections in April 2003. End summary. 
 
 
Real Economy 
 
 
¶2.  The economic clouds of 2002 have obscured the view 
of likely economic activity in the New Year. In early 
November 2002, IMF experts estimated that Nigeria's 
gross domestic product would decline 0.9 percent in 
real terms in 2002 owing to falling oil revenues. This 
figure, if confirmed, will be in stark contrast to the 
3.8 percent growth achieved in 2001.  The Central Bank 
has challenged the IMF figure and forecasts 3.2 percent 
growth for 2002.  Its basis for optimism is that non- 
oil sector output may have risen 5.3 percent in 2002, 
buoyed by a 4.1 percent increase in agricultural 
production owing to favorable rainfall. (The 
discrepancy points to the weak database and less than 
robust analysis.)  The GON also points to the dynamism 
of the telecommunications sector, which was energized 
by deregulation and the introduction of GSM telephone 
systems. Both the IMF and the GON recognize that the 
manufacturing sector remained weak in 2002, as capacity 
utilization did not exceed 41 percent during the year. 
Partly because of this fact, there is increasing 
consensus among Nigerians on the need to accelerate 
privatization, and market determination of the exchange 
and interest rates.  The Dutch Action System (DAS), 
which was introduced in mid 2002 to deal with the 
pressure on the exchange rate, has facilitated improved 
management of the exchange rate. 
 
 
¶3.  Whether one uses the IMF or Central Bank figures, 
the data still point to a setting in which purchasing 
power remains weak. Not only is the annual per capita 
income of the Nigerian population estimated to be below 
300 USD, its rate of growth approximates only 2.8 
percent a year. Consequently, the optimistic 3.2 
percent growth results in only a 0.4 percent rise in 
per capita income under the better of the two scenarios 
mentioned above. At such a low rate of increase, 
Nigerians are condemned virtually to perpetual poverty. 
It is a far cry from the 7.2 percent real per capita 
income growth that Nigerians would need to experience 
continually over the next ten years to double their 
income within a decade. 
 
 
¶4.  To achieve 7-10 percent real growth in any given 
year calls for an environment conducive to business. 
Last year's has not been so, according to Doyin Salami, 
a macroeconomics professor at the Lagos Business 
School. In mid-November, he shared data with us and 
business executives that showed that private sector 
turnover had just kept pace with inflation during the 
first half of 2002. A Lagos Business School survey of 
fast moving consumer goods then disclosed that the 
fastest moving items (like powdered milk) were 
necessities being packaged in ever smaller containers 
to be within reach of consumers' falling purchasing 
power. Expenditure switching was associated with this 
decline in sales volume, Salami asserted. Companies 
marketing consumer goods had to lower their margins in 
2002 to attract buyers since many poor people chose to 
buy goods like GSM telephones rather than essential 
items, notwithstanding their low level of income. 
Consequently, unadjusted profits for the non-financial 
sector fell by 6.4 percent during the period, he said. 
The ratio of losers to winners during this time was 
three to one, he added. A report appearing in the 
December 30 issue of Business Day carried the headline, 
"Economic Lull Impacts on Companies' Profits." 
 
 
¶5. Except for cases in which the purchase of cellular 
phones facilitates earning a living, other instances of 
inessential purchases may rightly be considered 
conspicuous spending.  Such spending affects aggregate 
growth only at the margin. The reason is simple: there 
are simply too few Nigerians with substantial 
purchasing power. Salami and his better-known colleague 
at the business school, Pat Utomi, presented data 
bearing out this point. Regarding distribution of 
wealth, Salami said the richest four-percent of the 
population in Nigeria possesses 48 percent of the 
country's wealth. The next cohort accounts for 46 
percent of the population and holds 44 percent of the 
wealth. The bottom 50 percent of the population 
accounts for 8 percent of the wealth. This highly 
skewed distribution of wealth is sub-optimal with 
respect to economic growth. Since the richest cohort's 
propensity and ability to import is much larger than 
that of the other two- thirds of the population, much 
of the income of the top four percent of the population 
helps to sustain foreign economies, not Nigeria. But 
this group is numerically so small that it absorbs 
little of Nigeria's manufactured products.  This group 
also generally disdains Nigerian goods and will buy 
imported items whenever it can, further compounding the 
problem. Its savings or surplus income, which accounts 
for a large proportion of total private savings, is 
consequently often channeled abroad. Such capital 
flight further holds back Nigeria's economic growth. 
 
 
¶6.  There is another dysfunctional form of conspicuous 
spending in Nigeria: that for political position.  In 
many other countries, people with money invest in 
industry or services as these sectors of economic 
activity generate wealth.  In Nigeria, however, many 
people with money invest directly in the political 
sector or indirectly by backing politically ambitious 
individuals.  It is common knowledge that in Nigeria 
politics can be the short road to massive wealth. How 
else can one account for the substantial cost of recent 
electoral activity in Nigeria?  Funding of it, whether 
originally through a draw down of foreign exchange 
reserves, has been distributed primarily in naira to 
advance the political prospects of various people. An 
Emboff's informed estimate of the cost of the Peoples 
Democratic Party convention in Abuja last week is that 
it approximated 60 million USD. 
 
 
¶7. Continuing in this vein, Utomi added that statistics 
show that funding for the federal, state, and local 
governments has quadrupled since 1998, yet little of it 
is used productively. (Central Bank data confirm that 
the revenues that accrued to the state and local 
governments increased by a factor of four in nominal 
terms during 1997-2001. Federal government revenues 
nearly doubled during the same period.  The greater 
distribution of revenue to state and local governments 
during the Fourth Republic (relative to the 
distribution in 1997-1998 during military rule) is 
partly the result of a requirement imposed on the 
federal government by the 1999 constitution.)  To make 
his point, Salami referred to a value-for-money audit 
that the IMF and the World Bank conducted in Nigeria 
and said its value-for-money index was put at fourteen 
percent at the Conference on Development that was held 
in Monterrey, Mexico in March 2002. Consequently, 
little of the government revenue allocated to economic 
and social services has the intended effect. (Comment. 
We were told that a value-for-money coefficient of 14 
signifies that only 14 out of every 100 naira collected 
by the federal government is spent effectively.  End 
comment.)  According to Utomi, no more than a tenth of 
the 100,000 young men and women who graduate from 
Nigeria's post-secondary institutions every year obtain 
adequate urban employment within one year of 
graduation, for example. Few of these adults find 
meaningful alternative employment in the rural sector 
since the wages are too low to attract them. Rural 
wages remain low partly because forty percent of total 
agricultural production is lost owing to inadequate 
infrastructure. 
 
 
Fiscal Policy 
 
 
¶8. Nigeria's less-than-reassuring fiscal policies are 
the cause of the overcast 2003 outlook.  The central 
government's overall budget deficit target for 2002 was 
set at -446 billion naira (about 3.7 billion USD). 
Reviewing the performance of the federal government 
during the first part of the year, Salami showed that 
the overall fiscal balance stood at minus Nl19.5 
billion (about 1.0 billion USD), which equaled 4.3 
percent of GDP (assuming 3.2 percent real growth in 
2002). This figure for the deficit appeared in the 
Central Bank's report for the first half of 2002. 
Should it turn out that the target figure for 2002 was 
realized, fiscal policy will have been as expansionary 
in 2002 as any policy of the last four years. Although 
oil revenues were 36 percent lower during the first 
half of 2002 than during the first half of 2001 because 
Nigeria's OPEC quota limited its export volume, federal 
government revenues still exceeded the budget estimate 
by 29.7 percent in the first six months of 2002. 
However, recurrent expenditures alone rose 14 percent 
during the period relative to those of the first half 
of 2001. The total of recurrent expenditures and the 
federal government's capital expenditures and net 
lending "resulted in a large monetary financing of a 
huge deficit" during the first half of 2002, according 
to the Central Bank. More recent Central Bank data 
indicate that recurrent expenditures accounted for 77.7 
percent of the central government budget and exceeded 
the target by 10.6 percent during the first ten months 
of 2002. Personnel costs associated with a bloated 
civil service accounted for 70 percent of these 
recurrent expenditures. 
 
 
¶9. The Central Bank's announcement of late December 
that the federal government had recorded a deficit of 
47.5 billion naira (about 400 million USD) during the 
first ten months of 2002 was unexpected, given that the 
budget deficit for the first semester 2002 totaled 
119.5 billion naira. The reason for the remarkable 
turnaround was the inclusion in the government's 
retained revenue of the proceeds of the sale of 
external reserves and of borrowing from the banking 
system. As noted in the Bank's report for October, "in 
the ten-month period, the Federal Government 
substantially drew down on its deposits with the 
Central Bank of Nigeria, resulting in further injection 
of liquidity in the banking system." Although Obasanjo 
slashed capital expenditures during the first nine 
months of 2002, we expect that the data for the last 
quarter will show that the federal government's net 
lending, capital expenditures, and transfers to state 
and local governments will have picked up in 2002. We 
further expect that this trend will continue during the 
first six months of 2003 because of expenditures 
associated with contracts typically awarded at the end 
of a presidential administration and other handouts of 
patronage. 
 
 
Monetary Policy 
 
 
¶10.  Nigerian analysts know that the Central Bank has 
the unenviable task of ensuring that monetary policy 
accommodates fiscal policy. Although the rate of growth 
of the monetary aggregates had slowed during the first 
six months of this year relative to the figures for the 
first half of 2001, by the end of October broad money 
(M2) had risen by 32 percent against a target of 15.3 
percent for 2002. The increases were driven by 
excessive bank credit to the domestic economy; 
primarily government credit, which rose 602.1 percent 
during the first six months of this year relative to 
the corresponding period a year ago. The Central Bank 
itself subscribed to 45 percent of the treasury bills 
issued during the period. Reflecting the government's 
inability or unwillingness to make further cuts in the 
budget in the light of a continuing budget deficit, 
government borrowing picked up during the subsequent 
four months (July-October) of 2002. Central Bank data 
for October show that government credit rose a whopping 
836 percent during the first ten months of 2002. 
 
 
¶11.  The crowding out of the private sector has thus 
been an important feature of the money and capital 
markets in 2002. Bank credit to the private sector rose 
by only 8.7 percent in the first ten months of the 
year, a far cry from the annual target of 34.9 percent. 
Equally important was the fact that non-bank public 
subscription to treasury bills rose by a factor of ten 
in the first half of 2002 relative to the corresponding 
period the year before. (The Central Bank's and 
commercial banks' subscriptions to treasury bills rose 
by a factor of seven during the same period.) While it 
may have appeared that the Central Bank's reduction of 
the Minimum Rediscount Rate (MRR) by 400 basis points 
in late October, to 18.5 percent, would stimulate 
private sector lending, the reduction also lowered the 
cost of government borrowing and so may have encouraged 
such further borrowing. For these reasons, the cut in 
the MRR late in the year is particularly worrisome; 
such action is counter-intuitive since the budget 
deficits have caused the liquidity overhang. 
 
 
¶12.  Bowing to political pressure, the Central Bank of 
Nigeria (CBN) nonetheless further reduced the 
rediscount rate to 16.5 percent in late December and 
called on banks to lower the prime lending rate to MRR 
+ 400 basis point. Unpublished preliminary data of the 
Central Bank that we saw on December 30 indicate that 
this reduction in the MRR has lowered inter-bank 
lending rates. Rates have come down partly because the 
first tranche of the December 2002 statutory federal 
government allocation to the state and local 
governments trickled into bank vaults in late December. 
Professor Salami and other economists we have talked to 
caution that the lower rates are unlikely to hold since 
inflation and default risk drives interest rates. Since 
neither of these two drivers will lose momentum during 
the next six months, lending rates will remain high as 
institutional investors flock to treasury bills in a 
flight to quality.  Moreover, deposit banks are likely 
to find ways to increase their lending rates, Salami 
said. He anticipates the development of an underground 
market in which loans will be extended at MMR plus 400 
basis points plus a premium to take account of erosion 
of asset values induced by an expected rise in 
inflation early next year. An Emboff already knows of 
an instance in which a contact of his who wants to 
import equipment to process cashews asserted that he 
was recently quoted a rate of interest of 35 percent, 
plus a 2 percent charge for documentation, and a 5 
percent transfer charge.  The interest rate plus the 
charges total 42 percent, a far cry from the 20.5 prime 
interest rate that the Central Bank is recommending. 
 
 
Foreign Account 
 
 
¶13.  Central Bank data show that Nigeria's trade 
surplus declined 45.3 percent during the first half of 
2002-to 2.6 billion USD-relative to the corresponding 
period the year before. During the first six months of 
2002, export revenue declined 40 percent, to 6.5 
billion USD, and imports fell 35 percent. The 
invisibles account (services and income) totaled about 
-4.0 billion USD and current transfers equaled 697 
million USD during the first six months of 2002. 
Consequently, the current account deficit totaled 714 
million USD compared to a 1.35 billion USD surplus 
during the corresponding period in 2001. As a result, 
foreign exchange reserves fell from 10.45 billion USD 
at the start of the year to 8.7 billion USD at the end 
of June 2002. At the end of October, Nigeria's foreign 
reserves totaled about 8.0 billion USD. A review of 
Central Bank data shows that the expected trade, 
current account, and overall account figures for 2002 
are likely to be as bad as any data of the last three 
years. 
 
 
¶14. To stanch the expected outflow, the Central Bank in 
July began allocating foreign exchange through a Dutch 
Auction System, which has narrowed the gap to about ten 
points between the parallel and official rates of 
exchange throughout fall 2002. But pressure has built 
up and there is no reason to expect it to decline. The 
Central Bank recently re-authorized twenty-one banks to 
buy foreign exchange, lifting a ban ahead of time that 
had forbade these banks from engaging in such 
transactions owing to violations of foreign exchange 
regulations. The demand for forex by these banks will 
put pressure on the naira and may lead to further 
depreciation. Consequently, and given the political 
uncertainty ahead, we expect that a larger than normal 
volume of funds will flow out of the capital and money 
markets and into the foreign exchange market during the 
next several months. Such movement will test the recent 
stability in the foreign exchange market, as funds 
drift out of the money and capital markets in response 
to the uncertain electoral prospects in spring 2003. 
 
 
¶15. In the light of the developments mentioned above, 
Professor Salami warns that Nigeria is experiencing a 
"lull before a damaging storm." He cautions that the 
central government might soon find itself unable to use 
foreign reserves as the primary mechanism to manage the 
exchange rate. Nigeria's foreign reserves rose slightly 
in November relative to October, but the volume remains 
close to the CBN's self-imposed minimum six-month limit 
necessary to sustain imports. We expect a further 
temporary rise in foreign exchange as a result of the 
recent spike in oil prices and slightly larger OPEC 
quota for Nigeria, which will yield larger revenues, 
and repatriated funds associated with the end of year 
holidays. These flows, associated with the seasonal 
weakening of demand for forex by manufacturers, have 
led to a temporary appreciation of the naira that is 
unlikely to be sustained for the reasons mentioned 
above. Should reserves fall much below that floor, the 
government will have no choice but to look for other 
adjustment mechanisms in 2003.  These might comprise 
extensive import bans and tightening of foreign 
exchange regulations (which would again widen the 
differential between the official and parallel 
markets). 
 
 
Prospects for 2003 
 
 
¶16. Salami suggested enigmatically that 2003 be called 
the Year of Two Halves. He, like several other analysts 
that we have talked to, expects that expansionary 
fiscal policy will characterize the first half of 2003. 
Salami thinks that a contractionary policy will follow 
during the second half of the year to cure what Salami 
calls fiscal hangover. Continuing deficit spending 
during the first half of the year, coupled with general 
uncertainty and capital flight, will maintain pressure 
on the exchange rate. As the naira depreciates during 
this time, Nigeria's heavy dependence on imports will 
induce a rise in inflation. This will cause continued 
erosion of asset prices, and savings will fall as a 
percentage of GDP. Given the relatively low level of 
foreign exchange, the Central Bank will be compelled to 
mop up excess liquidity and the attendant effect will 
be higher interest rates, if the rise is not suppressed 
by administrative fiat. In the light of these 
prospects, investors will be wary about imperiling 
dollar resources for naira; consequently, domestic and 
foreign investment in the non-oil sector in 2003 will 
be low relative to 2000-2001. 
 
 
¶17.  A few positive aspects may nevertheless emerge in 
¶2003.  The willingness of banks to devote 10 percent of 
their profits before tax to equity investments may 
boost investment in the real sector in 2003.  In 2002 
little was done with this pool of investible funds, 
which is building up, but creative initiatives by some 
banks and venture capital companies may lead to 
investments that will create employment.  Additional 
jobs are likely to be created in 2003 by the next phase 
of the deregulation of the telecommunications sector as 
the second national carrier, Globalcom Ltd., begins to 
deploy facilities early in 2003. 
Comment 
 
 
¶18. One key issue highlighted by the reports given us 
is the paucity and unreliability of data.  This is 
dramatized by the discrepancy between the projected 
growth rate for 2002 by the IMF (-0.9%) and the Central 
Bank of Nigeria (3.2%).  While there is little the 
analyst can do about the poor data, it is important to 
footnote this defect and add the necessary caveats to 
the robustness of the analysis. While the central 
message of a possible cloudy outcome is right on the 
mark, analytical focus on the fiscal and fiscal policy 
stance and foreign account suggests that Nigeria's 
economic outcome is almost solely the result of policy. 
A rigorous decomposition of the structure of the 
economy shows, however, that the oil and agricultural 
sectors account for about 60 percent of the GDP, and 
performance in both sectors is not driven essentially 
by monetary and fiscal policies.  Performance in the 
oil sector is primarily driven by OPEC and 
international oil prices, while agriculture is still 
largely weather dependent (recall the basis for the IMF- 
Central Bank of Nigeria huge discrepancy on 2002 growth 
rate).  Much of Salami's and Utomi's analysis focuses 
on the formal (largely manufacturing) sector, but 
manufacturing account for barely 5 percent of GDP. 
This is this kind of structural analysis that leads us 
to put the appropriate caveats to the gloomy forecast; 
it is possible for economic performance to 
significantly improve even without any improvement in 
policy. 
 
 
¶19.  Nevertheless, Salami's and Utomi's presentation of 
late November echoed warnings we have heard from other 
experts about the continuing structural imbalances 
within the economy. Government deficits accommodated by 
monetary policy perpetuate these imbalances. These will 
become even more apparent should oil revenues fall. 
Many countries engage in deficit spending to stimulate 
growth; in Nigeria, however, public spending is largely 
ineffective at increasing sustainable development. The 
reason is that so little of those public funds are 
channeled into productive investment.  Moreover, 
government spending disproportionately favors the 
richest four-percent of the population identified 
earlier. These people tend to travel abroad and account 
for a disproportionate share of imports. These factors 
will put additional pressure on the naira.  Since the 
rich generally seek to convert naira into foreign 
exchange quickly when they have large volumes of 
Nigerian currency (as many did so recently during the 
political party conventions), to reduce exchange rate 
risk and because forex is less bulky, the naira will 
surely depreciate during the coming months. 
Conversely, interest rates will remain high to attract 
capital inflows.  So it is to be feared that instead of 
stimulating growth, excessive government spending will 
crowd out the private sector, which will force 
companies to scramble for funds at high interest rates. 
 
 
¶20.  High interest rates will affect not only the 
private sector.  The cost of government borrowing will 
also remain high.  Consequently, investment in 
infrastructure (roads, education, and public health) 
which has been badly neglected during the last several 
years may continue to be so.  An Emboff who has 
accumulated eight years in Nigeria believes that its 
infrastructure is generally decaying.  What is certain 
is that new investment is insufficient to cover the 
needs generated by population growth and depreciation 
of existing assets.  To redress this situation, fiscal 
policy as it has been implemented throughout the last 
ten years must change. 
 
 
¶21. Improving fiscal policy would call for public 
service reform and a budgetary process based on a 
better appreciation of economic principles. We have 
often heard Nigerian economists criticize their 
government's budget formulators for establishing 
budgets premised on one scenario and usually based upon 
a single oil price. Many of these economists recommend 
that budgets be based on multiple scenarios with 
clearly defined trigger points.  For our part, we think 
that the GON should encourage the Central Bank to issue 
a directive to banks informing them that any and all 
future lending to states and local governments would be 
at their risk.  The federal government would thus offer 
no guarantee and would refuse to "deduct at source" 
(i.e., before disbursements from the Federation 
Account) any payments on such debt.  The Central Bank 
could also issue a "caveat emptor" notice to 
international banks to discourage lending to states. 
While such actions by the Central Bank would annoy some 
state-level politicians, there would be little they 
might do about it.  (Few local governments are in a 
position to borrow.)  Assuming such actions led to a 
modification of Nigeria's budgetary practices, it would 
not only reduce uncertainty; it would also reassure 
observers that while they may not see improvement in 
the next quarter or two, subsequent quarters might hold 
promise of a brighter future. 
 
 
HINSON-JONES