What are the problems of Nigeria enterprises?

Answer 1

There are various kinds of opinions by many scholars on activities of privatization and commercialization of public enterprises. The federal government has restated its commitment to the privatization programme saying that it would not allow obstacles to make it change its focus.

Ukwu (1982:87) said that the perennial problem of public enterprise arise from the composition of the Board and its relationship with management. In particular, the conflict between the chairman and the chief executive himself usually a direct appointee are appointed for reasons of political patronage rather than any contributions they are capable of making to enhance performance.

Ugoo .E. ABBA (2008 : 248) argued that some public enterprises whose establishments are hinged on regulatory philosophy have also not lived up to standard. Due to endemic corruption in these enterprises, officials collect bribes and truncate their primary reasons for establishment.

But in the words of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo (1999) in his assessment of the decline in Nigeria's public enterprises asserts that these enterprises suffer from fundamental problems of defective capital structure, excessive bureaucratic control or intervention in appropriate technology, gross incompetence and mismanagement, blatant corruption and crippling complacency which monopoly engenders.

Excessive ministerial control and political interference according to Ogunna (1999:246) defeat the primary objective of living-off public corporations and therefore, are anti-thetical to effective performance.

Ryndima et al (1980:45-55) dealing on the political economy of surplus argued that for there to be an increase on productivity or output commonly known as "surplus value", there will be intensified exploitation of the workers in the public corporations". These measures can be lengthening the hours of work, were these can measure up; there are other ways of getting their desired objective, example by speeding up work (production) over time and underpayment of workers.

In the words of Ogunna (1999), the poor performance of public enterprises in Nigeria can be approached from the perspective of inadequate financial and material resources, poor management, corruption and lack of continuity of public corporation boards.

On the other hand, the civilian governments of first and second republic appreciated the need for the policy of privatization and commercialization, which was reflected in the various panels to that effect which they established.

Ollor (1986:4) was in support when he said that given the economic recovery objective of government "privatization will relieve the financial burden of government and release fund for it to use in other areas.

General Abdusalami Abubakar (rtd) came to power in June (1998), he continued with the policy with much more vigor and planned to privatize or at least commercialize all public enterprises which he believed would not only salvage the ailing public enterprises, make them more effective, but would in addition, provide enormous funds to government for other public services.

Obadan hints that the enhancement of efficiency should be the primary objective of a privatization programme. This is because maximum efficiency will bring more sustained gains, which can then be distributed to a wider segment of the society.

Lewis (1994:178) supports the view of efficiency, that the private sector is to be more efficient, more productive and more profitable. In short, privatization according to him would increase government revenues and cut down or eliminate waste and unnecessary bureaucracy.

Nellis (1999) in Obadan 2000:19 agreed with above assertion by saying that in empirical terms, various assessment of privatization outcomes, particularly in the industrial and middle-income countries have concluded that privatization leads to improve performance of private companies and that privately owned firms outperforms "state owned firm". He posits that increasing evidence also shows that privatization yields positive result in lower income and transition countries as well.

Guislain (1997:173) is of the view that the move for privatization is that most government find themselves facing deep budget deficits and public finances crisis". The state no longer has the financial resource either to offset the losses of state-owned enterprise (SOEs) or to provide the capital increases necessary for their development. Thus, emphasizing that privatization is the answer as most of SOEs are deeply involved in corrupt practices that have depreciated its values, to achieve the basic requirement expected of it.

The Director General, Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), Dr. Christopher Anyanwu said that government would hinder it from meeting its privatization objectives.

He listed the objectives of the privatization among other things to include the restructuring and rationalization of the public sector in order to lesson the dominance of unproductive investments, beside, privatization was targeted at raising funds for financing social-economic development in areas such as health, education and infrastructure.

General Ibrahim Babangida's administration was the first to take concrete steps towards privatization and commercialization of some public enterprises.

Having reviewed some books on administrative and management problems of public enterprises and possible ways of reformative measures and the cause of these problems that have engulfed these public enterprises especially from the external and internal factors and also having reviewed some books and articles on these privatization and commercialization policy has been detrimental to the poor in the society. Let us now attempt a review of some books and articles that see privatization and commercialization as an exploitative tool in the hands of ruling class and its foreign allies.

Nnoli .O. (1981:4) historically, introduced the issues of initial rationale why government involved in business activities, that those reasons should not be sacrificed at alter of bourgeoisie inclined profit maximization. He contends because public parastatals was only peripheral to the interest of the foreign capitalist conditions of work in it particularly the wages were attractive than in the private companies with a consequent lowering of workers moral and productivity. That the public sector should not be blamed for its inefficiency because at the dawn of independence, change has occurred in public sectors, most of its activities were performed by private contractors and their failure is the success of the private sector.

Another article assessed the different dimensions of which privatization and commercialization have been viewed by various scholars. I think the programme from the on set had no clear focus. The government was not really sure what it wanted from the programme and consequently the TCPC itself did not know where its true mission was. They never knew whether their mission was raising money for the government or sharing of the national cake.

Furthermore, Bala (2004) found out that the privatization in Nigeria has been able to replace the public monopoly with private monopoly. However, the major impact of the reform has been in the area of increased competition and efficiency. These were evident in the telecommunication, petroleum and banking sectors.

According to Garba on Vanguard, Thursday, September 10, 2009, today, the world has virtually become a global village in terms of communications and doing business is gradually shifting from boardrooms to individual homes, courtesy of teleconference. In view of these developments, two countries are looking up to you the experts to ensure that their relations are boosted by the content innovative trends in Telecommunications.

Mr. John Odey, the Minister of Environment (2009) said although the telecommunications industry had impacted positively on the economy and lives, it should not be allowed to hamper people's health and environment. We must balance the social, economic and environmental aspects of our developmental areas.

Kalu (1999) contributed that as at the end of 2005, over 10 enterprises have been privatized while over 30 enterprises have been commercialized. For example, National Electric Power Authority (NEPA), now Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), Nigeria Telecommunications Limited (NITEL), now Nigeria Telecommunication Plc etc.

According to Federal Government of Nigeria (1993), the long term goal of a telecommunication enterprise is not only to be self financing but also to generate a reasonable return on investment and provision of digital exchanges; transmission links, gateways, and cellular telephone system all over the country.

Amechi argues that with the Nigerian belief which holds that government enterprises are nobody's property every one inside and outside then strives to loot them and no one preserves them. He argues that privatization is a step fighting this ugly trend.

Answer 2

The big three are massive government corruption, organized crime and complete and utter lack of any international trust due to decades of 419 (Nigerian) scams.

Answer 3

There are many problems facing business organizations in Nigeria. The most common include high taxes, counterfeit products, corruption, economic status and competition from external markets.

Answer 4

corruption