POST COVID19 ECONOMY WILL DEMAND
DECISION, TRAINING, SOLUTIONS FOR RECOVERY
Some of the rudimentary issues
induced by Covid pandemic have to be acknowledged in order to appreciate the
enormity of economic devastation and havoc that have taken place across the globe.
Perhaps the best starting point is
the experience in Wuhan, China where the first case was reported in December
2019. The panic alone caused a lot of
loss of man-hour; then followed by actual attack of thousands if not millions,
of workers and families resulting in hospitalization and death of some
percentage of victims. There is no doubt that Chinese budget for 2019/2020 was
over-stretched. The projects and all
other economic activities expected to take place in that period via budget
allocation were obviously short-changed by the sudden outbreak of Covid.
Beyond the financial cost of the
global war against the scourge, some of the victims were skilled and expert
corporate and private individuals. Their
demise and or incapacitation meant huge losses for the economy. Training and replacement of them would
certainly take a toll on the budget, but first, there must be a firm decision
that it is the way forward.
Partial, complete lock-down and curfew
were some of the measures applied in tackling the menace. During these periods no tourism, no economic
activities took place, except those essential preserving services. That meant loss of productive hours for as
long as it lasted. It also meant abandonment
of projects, breach of contracts, rusting of facilities and equipment etc. Needless to analyse these consequences to the
logical point of litigation, whether rational or irrational.
Every country as much as Nigeria
borrowed a leaf from Chinese experience.
Of course we are aware that the health care sector immediately became
the battle field; both the staff and facilities were over-stretched to breaking
point. The personnel became the next
wave of attack and spread of the deadly disease. We may not know the actual cost inflicted on
the global economy by covid.
However, what we do know is that the
entire global economy was forced to stagnate and consequently driven several
steps backwards. If we extrapolate to
every nation these basic economic issues raised by the first case of covid the
task of rebuilding the global economy would depend on massive training.
The pandemic was a sudden outbreak
and it would be foolhardy to say that global infrastructure and security architecture were absolutely dependable when the
disease broke out. Therefore a new security architecture would become imperative. The Paris/Copenhagen protocol on climate change
and their mitigation provisions remain as helpless as ever. How can these provisions be enforced? Were
they not meant to solve global problems staring us in the face? Where lies the burden of corporate social responsibility?
It is therefore apparent that
post-covid world would expect at national levels the enactment of new
legislation. For instance do you need
the declaration of state of emergency under s. 305 of the 1999 Constitution for
a complete or partial lock-down by the President or Governor? If that is the case, what then is the use of
executive orders?
Does the doctrine of force-majeure alone
compel governments and corporate
organizations to break the law or implement policies against fundamental human
right without any law authorizing that#?
Again the issue of social distancing
has produced industrial innovation called ‘working from home’. This innovation
seems to have been adopted to be the future of work place. Presently social distancing has proved
difficult to enforce in crowded cities and where you have grass-root people in markets and social gatherings as
well as religious meetings. It’s been
reported quite widely that some religious groups find it difficult to maintain
social distance during observance, believing that God would not allow the
infection. What a pity. Why then is the world searching for
vaccines?
With the World Health Organisation
(WHO) saying covid has come to stay, the inevitable conclusion are that there
must be at least one vaccine/medicine that cures covid. The world will remain indoors and online,
living skeletal jobs outside the home.
More and more people would hate work with a lot of people hating staying
at home. But most importantly they would hate covid the root of the
problems. Then the desire for entrepreneurship
would expand and grow after the battle against covid is over.
Iyke Ozemena Esq
Corporate Attorney/Consultant #corporateleaders
IKECHUKWU O.
ODOEMELAM & CO, Legal
Practitioners
corporateleadersboard.blogspot.com
www.amazon.com/Iyke-Ozemena/e/B0078UY9VQ?ref=dbs...
