NIGERIA TO BENEFIT FROM OBAMA’s “USE IT OR LEAVE IT” POLICY

The expectant echoes of the Barack Obama’s soon to be inaugurated presidency in the United States of America might have recorded its first true translation of the high hopes of Nigerians over the Obama presidency to a commitment of assistance soon after the inauguration of the first black man to emerge president of the United States of America.

Yet, this support, in its present form, is not a programmed or any of the contemplated official aids or support for Nigeria by the United States of America’s president elect. Rather, Fortune and Class Weekly has been informed that a USA based non for profit, info-tech focused organization, Saigant Technologies, was alert enough to locate an immediate opportunity that can be utilized for the benefit of Nigerians in the first set of economic stimulus package the president elect as assured Americans he is going to introduce to revitalize the recession bound American economy.

Mr. Obama, had on Saturday, December 6, 2008, in a radio address on the economy reviewed how 533,000 jobs were lost in the US and how jobs lost alone in November became the single worst month of job loss in over three decades.

“Yesterday, (December 5, 2008) we received another painful reminder of the serious economic challenge our country is facing when we learned that 533,000 jobs were lost in November alone, the single worst month of job loss in over three decades. That puts the total number of jobs lost in this recession at nearly 2 million.” Obama said in the broadcast

Highlighting the areas of worries for the average American, Obama said:

“But this isn’t about numbers. It’s about each of the families those numbers represent. It’s about the rising unease and frustration that so many of you are feeling during this holiday season. Will you be able to put your kids through college? Will you be able to afford health care? Will you be able to retire with dignity and security? Will your job or your husband’s job or your daughter’s or son’s job be the next one cut?”

“These are the questions that keep so many Americans awake at night. But it is not the first time these questions have been asked. We have faced difficult times before, times when our economic destiny seemed to be slipping out of our hands. And at each moment, we have risen to meet the challenge, as one people united by a sense of common purpose. And I know that Americans can rise to the moment once again.”

The president elect thereafter informed the American public of his economic recovery plan when he assured that:

“But we need action – and action now. That is why I have asked my economic team to develop an economic recovery plan for both Wall Street and Main Street that will help save or create at least two and a half million jobs, while rebuilding our infrastructure, improving our schools, reducing our dependence on oil, and saving billions of dollars.

“We won’t do it the old Washington way. We won’t just throw money at the problem. We’ll measure progress by the reforms we make and the results we achieve — by the jobs we create, by the energy we save, by whether America is more competitive in the world.

“Today, I am announcing a few key parts of my plan. First, we will launch a massive effort to make public buildings more energy-efficient. Our government now pays the highest energy bill in the world. We need to change that. We need to upgrade our federal buildings by replacing old heating systems and installing efficient light bulbs. That won’t just save you, the American taxpayer, billions of dollars each year. It will put people back to work.

The economic stimulus plan which is now known in some circle as the “Use it or Lose it” policy has as part of the plans the creation of millions of jobs by making the single largest new investment in America’s national infrastructure since the creation of the federal highway system in the 1950s:

“We’ll invest your precious tax dollars in new and smarter ways, and we’ll set a simple rule – use it or lose it. If a state doesn’t act quickly to invest in roads and bridges in their communities, they’ll lose the money.”

It is, however, in the president elect economic recovery plan to launch sweeping effort to modernize and upgrade school buildings and to repair broken schools by making them energy-efficient, and putting new computers in the classrooms that Nigerians stand to benefit in the immediate.

An official of Saigant Technologies, an organization that was established by a US based Nigerian, said a review of the US president elect radio broadcast of December 6, 2008, provided an immediate answer to the limitation to owning lap tops and desk top computers by Nigerian students.

“You should recall that the Mr. Obama talked about renewing American schools and highways, and about renewing information superhighway. For the president elect, it is unacceptable that the United States ranks 15th in the world in broadband adoption. He argued that in the country that invented the internet, every child should have the chance to get online, and promised that they’ll get that chance when he becomes President – because that’s how he wished to strengthen America’s competitiveness in the world. Now for us in Nigeria, the specific highlight of information technology overhaul as part of the economic stimulus plan of the president elect presented a begging opportunity to imagine what the incoming American government would do with those computers, lap tops and those IT accessories the government would be replacing in order to galvanize the American domestic economy.”

“We realized that the US government would have problems disposing off these equipment which, if compared to our standard of usage here in Nigeria, would look relatively new and in the light of the limited access to computer sets and lap tops in Nigeria, the simple logic was to approach the likely channel through which we could connect with the president elect to present our proposal of moving the American used laptops and computers to those that would need them in Nigeria.” The Saigant source said.

“We made a direct offer to the president elect through Change.Gov website of the president elect and the response is quite assuring. There is a commitment to accessing about 200,000 computer sets and laptops free of charge over the next two years that Mr. Obama would be implementing the first leg of the economic stimulus programme. Our responsibility will only be limited to footing the transportation and clearing cost of the laptops and computer sets here in Nigeria.” The source further affirmed.

“This will be the first major impact of the Obama presidency on the average Nigerian; our intention is to use the opportunity to present the 200,000 plus laptops and computer sets to Nigerians at a no price rate, to boost the nation’s capacity for information technology.”