In normal countries like Norway, Japan, Australia, Canada, government has nothing to do with forex. In a place like Norway where a forex yielding sector is nationalised, the impact impact or imprint on revenue profile is relegated forcefully by taxing people heavily to reduce the forex component of government revenue to like 20%. People who need forex are locals who import things. Never government. government does all its financial transaction in the local legal tender. People who bring in forex are those who sell locally produced things abroad. The banks and bureau de change are the intermediaries. If I am coming into Nigeria from Europe to buy cashew or ginger, I will deposit dollars into a domiciliary account with a Nigerian bank and then withdraw it when I land in Nigeria, I will change it to Naira at the bank, buy my ginger in Kano or my coffee in Kogi or Ijesa land, load it on ships headed to Europe to my customers. There is not supposed to be involvement of Government at all but if government floods the economy with Naira, the value of that currency will drop. The dollar from Europe will remain at the banks or bureau de change where importers who need it can access it. If Ijesa were a country, several billions of dollars will be brought to that country per annum to buy farm produce like cashew, cocoa, kolanuts, cotton and finished products like Trophy, Beta malt, Castel beer and etc, nails, paint, palm oil, plastics, vegetable oil and etc to sell in West Africa and across the world. There are also services which people come to Ilesa for from across Nigeria. Those products will be our forex earners. There are other economic activities going on in the state. Forex also come in by way of remittances from Ijesa abroad. Concord hotel was built by the late Captain Haastrup who made his money in Port Harcourt. He also built a technical village along Ibala road which I dont think he ever opened.


Forex comes into Nigeria from a variety of sources. Nollywood films sold abroad will be over 50 billion dollars per annum in volume. A good part of that dollars end up in Nigeria. People export charcoal, bitter kola, ginger, cashew, cocoa and etc to Europe, raking in billions of dollars. As a matter of fact, the chief earner of forex in Nigeria and by a wide margin must be the Southwest of Nigeria in form of remittances from abroad, farm produce, Nollywood, charcoal, gold, timber, crude oil and etc. More than 50 percent of Nigerian forex must come from this region. Only that the FG dare not touch it. They concentrate on the Niger Delta who are cooperative rape victims of the Nigerian state. The whole forex coming from the region may not be up to 20 billion dollars a year while the Southwest must be well over 50 billion dollars.


Take a place like Kano or the Northwest as a whole, if they were independent, forex earners for them will be groundnuts, tomatoes, Kannywood, pepper, maize, ginger, rice which will earn billions of dollars for them in West Africa alone. Their forex earnings will at least double that of the oil bearing South South. The SE has palm oil, cocoa, cassava, their share of Nollywood, remittances from abroad and etc, The main thing in this area is palm oil, a produce which Malaysia of less than 30 million population maybe making over 40 billion dollars a year from and etc. There should be no need for government to take forex from anyone or to be in charge of forex. They should infact as a rule not touch it.