The news of Nigeria’s immediate past Minister of Finance, Budgeting and National Planning picking up a job as an Alternate Executive Director , reporting to another former Minister from South Africa has stirred up concerns in me, even if it has been overlooked by Nigerians.
Are some of our finance ministers able to take the best decisions for Nigeria given the fact that their own ‘downside risks’ , are protected by a principal party that nations like ours have to deal with for a lot of things – chiefly major funding? Are we getting the best negotiations from these people that we appoint?
In most jurisdictions, industries are protected at the top because top executives have tremendous amounts of information that they can use with atomic effect against their former places of work. Even in Nigerian banking industry, when a Bank MD leaves one bank, the Central Bank of Nigeria says there must be a cooling-off period in which he cannot work in another bank because of how much information he has. He cannot also take customers away from his previous place of employment.