I don’t give money to beggars; I think it just gives them the incentive to keep begging instead of truly changing their lives.

I may be heartless in this, but you never know where the money is truly going. Is it for food, for shelter, or is it for drugs and alcohol?

Instead of giving your money to beggars why not give the money directly to charities? Here you can think that the money is going to your cause and really making a difference.

Reading this article I found myself agreeing that too often we don’t know where our money is going to with charities and we see glitzy balls but what is really reaching the public? I know that there are some charities who do this already but I really feel that with the internet there is no reason why charities can’t completely divulge their financial information. Revenues, expenses, where the money actually gets deployed. Heck add to this an independent study showing that the money was fairly being distributed on the ground level and you would have confidence in the charity and be willing to give more!

If all charities did open up their books would we be having a fiasco like current one over the spending of British MP’s? Maybe someone in the free press wants to look into this!

“The helicopter gunships hovered low over a crowded street, where people had gathered to celebrate an annual festival, and opened fire with machine guns and rockets, according to several accounts. ”

I am lucky to be out of the country! Here is the link to the full story.

I may be safely at home, but I can’t help but think of the new friends and new family that I have left behind… I am torn between joy to see the ones I love and agony for the suffering that is life in Nigeria.

I was fortunate to be spoiled on my trip; everyone went out of their way to make sure that I would never have any difficulties. Some places where I went I was treated like a rock star who could do no wrong. A special thanks goes to Francis, my brother and friend. Modestus, our driver extraordinaire who found ways to be there for me even on his days off. The Registrar, Peter, who worried about me and made sure I was looked after. Father Bosco, never wavering in his faith that good things were coming out of our work. To each of them and many more do I owe many thanks for making my adventure incredible. I wish that they will all be there to witness their country change.

At home my family and friends gave me tons of support, and everyone at work were encouraging. In some ways it felt like I had a guardian at home in Ben Agbonkhese; when ever I had any problems or wanted to meet new people he was there.

I was never alone while I was on the road. If there is any benefit or change that comes from my journey the people who got me there deserve the credit. I hope that for now they will accept my heartfelt thanks.

Sadly there has been a hostage killed in the delta region of Nigeria.

I am currently in Abuja and leaving for London tomorrow. This was my scheduled departure time but it will feel good to be in a safer place soon.

So in an effort to keep things local and practical to the students here I had a guest lecturer today named Frank Onwuachi from the Microfinance Bank of Oba. The idea was to get away from my theory and knowledge of what works in Canada and get some hands on training for here in Nigeria.

The presentation was a great success! The students seemed to have enjoyed it and got a lot of information out of it and Frank left saying he was happy to come and would be willing to do it again. All in all it seemed like a great win win for everyone.

Some of the things covered: The bank will give loans of up to 10 to 1 the cash you are willing to leave on deposit with them. So if you put 5,000 Naira on deposit they will loan you up to 50,000 Naira. So you don’t need a ton of collateral, which is a big problem for most poor people. You do need to have one guarantor for the loan but this can be anyone; your friend, brother or neighbor. The maximum amount they are willing to loan out is 200,000 Naira or around 1,250 USD.

The interest rates are shocking though. They offer two types of loans of 4% per month or 6% per month. These translate into 60% or 100% effective annual rates if compounded for 12 months. That is a lot of interest! I am told though that this is cheap compared to the 10% per month or 214% effective annual rate the money lenders outside of the banks charge.

The normal banking institutions charge 22% annually but are not accessible for the 65% of Nigerians who are still too poor to use them.

Frank’s family lives in Houston and he moved back to Nigeria a year ago to start his bank. Part of me looks at the effective annual rates and is shocked and appalled at them. Almost makes me think he is a crook. Then I look at the alternatives and think maybe he is a hero. At the end of the day I think he is an entrepreneur who is trying to provide loans to people who value them at more then what he charges. He told me his current delinquency rate is around 10% so not everything always works.

As much as I would love to see entrepreneurs have access to cheaper money this seems to be a win win for Frank and the people who borrow the money. Frank understands this and wants to make sure everyone is happy and he is servicing his customer. That is more then a lot of Nigerians! Truly he wants to do well and help out here, for that I applaud him.

A good friend of mine posted his list of 100 things to do in the world after a conversation we had a number of years ago. Check out Adam’s list here. He reminded me that I should put together my own again. So here is the current Bucket List!

Travel

1. Travel to Russia

2. Travel to Tibet

3. Go on a romantic holiday

4. Go to Carnival in Rio

5. Take a motorcycle trip with dad

6. Run with the bulls again with Mike

7. Walk on the Great Wall of China

8. See Mount Rushmore

9. Attend a Paris fashion week show

10. Travel to Morocco

11. Travel to Atlantic Canada

12. Travel to Turkey

13. Travel to Iran

14. Travel to Nicaragua

15. Walk on Antarctica

16. Go to the stampede

17. Go to space

Sports

18. Scuba dive with great white sharks

19. Scuba dive the Great Barrier Reef

20. Go white water kayaking

21. Take a week long canoe trip

22. Heli-skiing

23. Sail in the tropics

24. Play ice hockey

25. Run a triathlon

26. Skate at GM Place

27. Go deep sea fishing

28. Go snowmobiling

29. Mush a dog sled

30. Be in an adventure race

31. Raft through the Grand Canyon

32. Ride a bull

Activities

33. Go over 300 km/hr on a bike

34. Drive a Ferrari

35. Fly in a jet fighter

36. Give a motivational talk to a group of 100 plus people

37. Publish a book

38. Meet a prime minister

39. Plant a garden

40. Fly in a leer jet

41. Fire walking

42. Write a fan letter

43. Kiss the Stanley Cup

44. Go nude at Wreck Beach

45. Be interviewed on TV

46. Eat an orange straight from the tree

Events

47. Play in the World Series of Poker

48. Watch a Stanley Cup final game live

49. Join a protest

50. Watch a Manchester United game live

51. See a show on Broadway

52. Listen to the Dalai Lama live

53. Watch the launch of the space shuttle

54. See the Bare Naked Ladies in concert

55. See Keith Urban in Concert

Self Improvement

56. Learn how to fly

57. Take race car driving lessons

58. Take cooking lessons

59. Get my skydiving ticket

60. Learn sign language

61. Have a conversation in Spanish

62. Attend 10 philosophy lectures

63. Hear the life story of someone over 80

64. Find a business mentor

65. Learn how to perform 10 magic tricks

66. Read my own list of 100 books

67. Weigh 185lbs

68. Run 10k in 40 minutes

69. Bench press 200lbs

Family

70. Get married

71. Have a simple wedding at a court house

72. Salsa with my wife in the rain

73. Be a father

74. Adopt a child

75. Have a dog

76. Skinny dip with my wife

77. Have a BBQ with my whole family at my house

78. Take my whole family including my Mom, Dad and brother’s family on a holiday

79. Plant a fruit tree at my cottage for each child I have

80. Make pancakes for my whole family

81. Throw a big party for my parents anniversary

For Others

82. Take my niece and nephew on a trip

83. Start a fund for financing third world entrepreneurs worth at least 1 million

84. Coach minor hockey

85. Donate blood

86. Volunteer at a random festival or event

87. Change a piece of public polity

88. Change a strangers life

89. Work at a soup kitchen

90. Make a team member 10 million before 2020

91. Give away the clothes off my back

92. Make dinner for my 7 closest friends

93. Be a business mentor

94. Make someone’s dream come true

Stuff

95. Own a cottage

96. Build a tree house

97. Own a laser sailboat

98. Buy a piece of original art

99. Buy a company

100. Invest in an Indian small business

101. Own a good BBQ

So back in the 30’s Josef Schumpeter described economic growth as creative destruction. You tear down the old and use creative forces to rebuild it better then it was in the past.

This is what I am trying to teach to the students here with a little twist: positive creative destruction.

It is evident here that people can use creative destruction to keep the corruption going and even make it worse if they choose. If they could just keep the creative juices flowing in a positive direction maybe through a lot of baby steps they can destroy old system and replace it with transparency and justice.

It is hard trying to find a way to explain to the people that it is in their own interest not to be corrupt when the chances of getting caught are so low and the rewards so great. How to you explain to someone that they will be better off if they don’t take the million Naira when they know that no one will ever catch them. How would you explain that to someone in Canada let alone here?

The school takes the moral approach. I am trying both that and talking with them about their reputations. How if they take the money it may benefit them in the short term but then it has the potential of ruining there reputation. Not that they will get caught but that other people will suspect them of doing it. If that is the case then anyone who wants to do business with people who are not corrupt would not want to do business with them.

They can’t control the poor reputations of Nigerians at large but they can control their own individual reputations. My best advice for them getting a good reputation is doing what they say they will do. Don’t make false promises and don’t take bribes. Keep everything above board and it will open up doors for them in the future.

Keep your reputation, keep things moving positively to a better place, but don’t be afraid to destroy what was there before you. Schumpeter would have told them that it doesn’t need to be a brand new technology to do this, it can be as simple as using the resources they have at their disposal a little better. Can you get the work one with 9 people instead of 10, can you find a way to get production done one day faster. Can you actually motivate people to do a good days work!

All these are ways of using ingenuity with the local resources to take incremental positive creative destructive steps to improve themselves and their world around them.

Go and DESTROY!

So my last post I talked about the corruption that occurs here in Nigeria; who would I be if I only complained and didn’t offer any solutions!

To start with I think it is important to point out that most people are self interested and respond to the incentives created by the environment around them. For the politicians here in Nigeria their current incentives are to be corrupt. The risk of punishment is so small and the rewards are so great it makes sense (selfish sense) for them to take as much as they can for themselves.

So looking at it from the point of view as what we in the first world can do the first thing would be to help the citizens of Nigeria create a situation where the incentives of their politicians are to do good! As I said before the IMF and World Bank are giving billions in debt funding and subsidies to Nigeria that are not getting to the people. Instead it is the leaders that are taking the money. If the money is not going to those who need it then why give it. So as harsh as this sounds stop giving any money to Nigeria from the outside world.

To take things a step further I think that we should put sanctions on doing business with Nigeria. So much bribe money goes along with contracts being tendered here and none of the benefit gets to the people. Why should we tolerate the support of the corrupt?

If we stop giving the people at the top the ability to take massive amounts of bribe money from the outside world then maybe they will recognize that it is in their best interest to grow their country so that they can make more money that way. I keep wondering why they have not figured out that you could make this into an amazing economic power here and then they could put more money in their own back pocket since there would be so much more to go around. Of course you only make it into an economic power by having the common individual become economically independent like we have in the US or Canada.

So the first step would be some tough love!

The second step comes with my three wishes for Nigeria.

One: That they find their own Gandhi. Someone who can lead them through a peaceful revolution.

Two: That they have clear, transparent and free elections. This way it is truly the voice of the people that is heard. Let the people have control over their own future. They could bring in the UN to help them with this and give the UN the power to annul the elections if they are not carried out in a fair and orderly manner.

Three: That they have freedom of press. Even with the internets small penetration here you could still get massive amounts of information about government performance out to the people.

Inform the people of the truth of things and give them the ability to make their own changes. This way you will only stay in power if you do what is best for the people.

If there were good elections and free press then I would be all for supporting the governments that they elect and removing all sanctions. If the government does not get the money to the people the press would be able to report on it and in the next election the government would be kicked out of office.

Too radical? Don’t think I am right? Tell me some other ways?

When I meet new people in Nigeria one of the fist questions I try to ask them is if they could change one thing about the country what would it be. The answer is always resoundingly the same thing: fix the corruption.

Over the years billions of dollars has been transferred to Nigeria through loans from the IMF and the World Bank. These loans are meant to be for the common citizen but in talking with them they see none of the money. Instead what the common citizens see is a few people at the top who put billions of dollars into their own pockets and become untouchable here since they have so much cash.

The last three heads of police are all being investigated for corruption. It is pretty hard for the government to charge them with anything since the head of police was hired to fix the elections so people could get in power. How can you bite the hand that knows all of your secrets!

The great story I heard was of ballot boxes being stolen in elections and then allowed to be submitted and counted a couple hours later. What exactly do the election officials think one does with a stolen ballot box??? Check out this story to see what Amnesty International thinks about the situation:

http://thereport.amnesty.org/eng/regions/africa/nigeria

Or another story has the government giving favorable contracts and then getting kick backs off shore so that it can’t be traced here in Nigeria. And you wonder why Nigeria gets such a bad reputation in the world. This is the link to the most recent bribe case:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/04/business/04bribe.html?_r=1&ref=africa

The big problem for the average Nigerian is that this corruption is keeping them in the poverty trap. They can’t get enough assets put together to start saving and improving their education. At least if the government was truly trying to help the people and not themselves the citizens here would have a better chance of moving towards prosperity.

As if the pot holes the size of cars were not enough to keep things at a crawl when driving in Nigeria, add to that having to stop and talk to the police every 5 minutes!!

This would generally give you a sense of peace they are police officers after all! Here in Nigeria though it is a different story all together. As I have been told I can do anything I want here, after all if I have money freedom is just a bribe away!

At least the road blocks have a method for dealing with these things. A line up of the people who don’t want to pay slows thing down while a second much faster line with people hanging money out the window zips past. The general toll: 20 Naira or around 15 cents! We are lucky since we travel with a policeman that we don’t get stopped but the openness about the bribes is just amazing to see.

So far I have not had to pay any bribes. A little bit of charm and getting them to laugh is my first approach and if that doesn’t work then I throw a fit and yell at them. As a white person they are still a little fearful of me.

I don’t really know what is worse that the police all are looking for bribes here or that the fact that I am white and there is still racism here to make them scared of me gets me off from having to pay.

Here is a report going on from the BBC about the safety here in Nigeria. Enubu the city they are taken from is where I fly out in and out of and around 40 minutes from the house I am staying at.

Mom, you shouldn’t read these!!!

On Patrol With Nigerian Police

Nigeria’s Vigilantes