Soyinka, Tinubu advocate fresh ideas at book launch

Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka has launched the book entitled “Financialism:Water from an Empty Well” in Chicago, Illinois, United States with an advice to African leaders for a rethink of economic programmes, away from the ‘orthodox assumptions and givens under which their economies have taken a severe beating”. The rethinking as the professor of literature said becomes even more urgent with the collapse of the dominating economies of Europe and America.

The book launch took place Saturday 25 August, at the Rainbow Push Headquarters in Chicago , USA with Rev. Jesse Jackson as the host. The book was co-authored by former governor of Lagos state and national leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Brian Browne, former US consul general in Nigeria.

Presenting the book to an audience consisting of two Nigerian governors, former American diplomats, civil rights leaders led by Rev. Jesse Jackson, Nigerian professionals from Chicago and around America and Canada, Nigerian lawmakers, council chairmen and youths, Soyinka warned that it is dangerous for leaders who were economic illiterates to insist that they are literate and end up placing their countries on the path of economic perdition. According to Soyinka one of such leaders ruled Nigeria for about 8 years recently and only succeeded in multiplying Nigeria’s economic woes.

“ I have no qualms declaring that I am not fully economic literate, that is why I leave it to the experts to figure out. I am not in the least embarrassed or ashamed to acknowledge myself an economic illiterate. This is quite unlike a former Head of State who was thus dubbed and never forgave his perceptive analyst, even after his death. That economist was my late friend, Professor Ojetunde Aboyade,” the only specialist, Soyinka said he relied upon for his economic insights.

Soyinka acknowledged the authors as key figures in the unfolding world where the book they have both written opens a new window in our understanding of how the world’s financial system is architectured to the disadvantage of some people.

“The skewed world of economics needs to be challenged, a world where the umbilical cord between produce and tally-card was slashed when no one was looking, and the latter has come to be a thing-in-itself, empowering a parasitic class of finance controllers who place the mere tally over and above the material goods – yet succeed in making the rest of the world fall in line! The collapse of the dominating economies of Europe and America is a call for re-thinking, away from orthodox assumptions and givens, under which satellite economies in a distant continent like ours have taken a severe beating, whether or not their governments choose to admit it”.

Rev. Jesse Jackson who moderated the book launching and signing said it was time both the African and African –American perspectives fuse into one because both are challenged by similar issues. He welcomed the fact that the exposition in the book raises fundamental issues and goes further to provide answers as to why Africans and African –Americans live under a discriminatory economic system.

Asiwaju Tinubu, who spoke earlier on, stated the rationale behind the writing of the book, which he located in the injustices of the present economic system and how the contradictions eventually caught up with the players who left the low level income earner and small businesses with the short end of the stick.” Productive capitalism relies on the discipline of the market place. What now occurs is that powerful actors exploit the license the market place affords them. In doing so, they endanger the very economies from which they unduly profit. In other words, they have emptied the well yet continue to seek to take water from it. These people practice a speculative brand of economics. My co-author and I have given this mutation of capitalism the name of “financialism.” Financialism is capitalism so shorn of all restraint that it cannibalizes itself”

Tinubu decried this wiping away of the earnings of this struggling segment of the society and explained why there must be a new thinking and approach on how to deal with this problem. According to Tinubu, “–Recurrent crises show that something is profoundly wrong with the global financial system. Unless we want to suffer these damaging jolts for the foreseeable future, we need to make systemic corrections. Both developed and emergent nations have committed the similar sin of turning what should be productive economies into factories of financial speculation that generate more financial paper than they do material products that real people can use to improve their living conditions”.

Tinubu gave an advice to Nigerian leaders: “Nigeria needs to be put to work. We have a lot of catching up to do. Asian governments support the industrialization of their economies. Wise European nations are starting to retool their industrial base. Nigeria cannot hope to achieve prosperity simply by exporting exhaustible natural resources. We must follow the historic route that all large nations have followed in reaching national prosperity. We must make, create and export what we make and create”.

Brian Browne, the co-author in his remarks argued that recession has put Black America into a structural recession. “The financial system has become over inflated to the point of killing the productive sector”.

Ambassador Howard Jeter who reviewed the book stated that the two perspectives from Africa and the United States offer an invaluable insight into the global financial structure and offers practical solutions and challenges what we know as impositions.

Governors Rauf Aregbesola and Abiola Ajimobi of Osun and Oyo states also lent their voices to the call for a more equitable global financial order.