For how long shall we continue punishing our people?

One of the most interesting things I learnt in International trade is

devaluation of currency. Devaluation is the reduction in the value of a country's currency in relation to that of her trading partners.

Benson Bello, as a student journalist in University of Nigeria, Nsukka in 1980 wrote about Inflation in terms of a Bread loving family, whereby a sibling got a knock for wanting to spend an amount of money on Bread instead of spreading the spending as that amount of Bread will not make sense and years later a younger sibling says he would spend that same amount on Bread but because the price of Bread had over time risen, he was greeted with smiles.

Now to understand Devaluation, picture our Naira exchanging for one dollar and today, the same naira is worth one dollar divided by 500.

What it means is that should Americans want to patronize Nigerian sellers, the Nigerians would sell a lot because with one dollar they can buy 500 Naira worth of goods. By the same token, for Nigerians to buy from US would be discouraging.

But what do you know? Every now and then, the Naira loses value but what happens?

We keep struggling to get more dollars with loads of Naira.

The question is why? The answer is multifaceted.

Number one is lifestyle. We want to look like Americans.

We want to eat what they eat.

We want their music.

We want to speak like they do.

Not just Americans but foreigners.

In return, we are cheap but they do not want us. Not our ways. Not our goods.

The Oil we sell is in their currency.

The more we devalue our currency, the more we pile misery on our people because prices keep rising.

One will wonder if our leaders know? Of course they do and the reason they are not bothered is because Oil is sold in dollars and in Nigeria, Government pays salary in Naira, so the heavier the dollar, the more the Naira at the disposal of the Government.

Should Government then pay Nigerians in dollars?

The question should be answered by us all.