Hamzat aminat Kanyinsola 
18/sms09/046

Question: 

Civic-19 pandemic impact on the global economy between december 2019 and april 2020

90 days. 
That is all it took. 90 days and over half the world has been subdued and forced into limbo where everyone seems to just be hanging on, even the rich and wealthy.
     2.35 million confirmed cases in over 185 countries according to the news Network Al Jazeera including most parts of Europe and North and South America. And in the last half a month has also started to ravage Africa,Nigeria already counting over 500 cases, with only 18 countries not yet affected or confirmed to be affected including the 
Comoros, Kiribati, Lesotho, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, North Korea, Palau, Samoa, Sao Tome and Principe, Solomon Island, South Sudan, Tajikistan, Tonga, Turkmenistan, Tuvalu, Vanuatu and Yemen.
    To say many of the world governments were under prepared for this virus, that did not even officially become a pandemic till March by which time it had already amassed a death toll of thousands is an understatement and below I will try to highlight some ways they were prepared and a lot of ways they weren't for Covid 19.
    As a precaution to curb the rapid spread of this virus, the Federal Government of Nigeria, issued lockdown in a number of states in the Federation including Lagos, the FCT, Kano and Ogun state because it was discovered, by the WHO, that direct contact with the infected was the viruses main way of spreading whether through handshakes, hugs etc.
    Now although the government seem to have taken a few things into account, for example the depreciation in the economy because the most affected places are Lagos and Abuja with one being the essential business hub of the country and the other the Federal Capital Territory.
    It would have been obvious to the Nigerian government that because of this figurative  or maybe even direct hit on the countries economy it would also probably been obvious to them (FG) that there would be some sort of civil unrest with statistics showing that over 40% of Nigerians survive of a dollar a day which the equivalent of that would be just a little over 350 naira and with the majority of that being in Lagos itself.
    I use the words should and would because any sane government could have made these deductions based on available data from world organizations, but in the end that did not stop them from under performing quite spectacularly as they usually do, with probably the best response being from Lagos State which may very well be carrying the whole country on it's back economically.
    The major or primary intention of the shutdown because of the virus for example  the shutdown of schools. if schools shut down, their students may not have access to meals. Millions of students, in school districts big and small, rely on the free or discounted meals they eat at school. The shutdown of various places is to keep people safe from the virus.
    Now as for the unintended impacts of the shutdown, this one thinks that it would be quite obvious to see that the statistics the government received was severely outdated and because of this the amount of vandalism and violence that we are witnessing in the country right now can only be likened to that which is experienced mostly in a war zone were those with weapons terrorize and inflict injury because they have not had a bite to eat all day. 
   The unintended consequences of this shutdown as also caused a lot of things like lack of access to food and other essential commodities, inflation, security issues as seen in Lagos and Ogun with One Million Boys on rampage. There could also have been other robbery gangs in other parts of the world, there are also e-frauds (I read one recently which involved Germany, Australia and Nigeria. Germany was defrauded by a company who claimed to be able to get masks and some other stuffs for them. The account involved was traced to Nigeria)
    Even the impact on the economy I feel was sourly underestimated by the government with the UN saying that this virus is estimated to cost at least $1 trillion and even UNCTAD saying that the oil prices which have already dipped considerably in price are expected to continue to dip this information is according to the World Economic Forum.
    As Crude Oil is this countries main export it is only a wonder how Nigeria will come out of the other side of this pandemic, if, we will come out at all.