In less than forty-eight hours from now, it will be 2009 on the Gregorian calendar.

Given the tragic events that have occurred as 2008 mercifully nears its end with the lethal Israeli airstrikes and slaughter of no fewer than 270 the hapless Palestinians last weekend and the carnage in Jos before it, there are few reasons for anyone to believe that 2009 will bring more joy than the pains we experienced in abundance this year.

Still, it wasn't as if 2008 was all bad news depending, of course, on our individual priorities and ideological perspectives. For the first time in its history, we applauded as the United States elected its first African-American president. Indeed, Barack Obama's election ignited renewed hope among democrats across the world on the assumption that other nations would allow issues, and not primordial sentiments, to determine elections at all levels. It took only the senseless massacres in Jos to dispel whatever illusions many might have had on these shores that what happened in America could be replicated locally. That was not the only shocker of the year however.

For the first time since the release of Karl Marx's Das Kapital and the Bolshevik revolution it inspired, capitalism as an efficient vehicle of human economic existence received its first major inquest from which the world is still grappling for answers. Now that governments of nearly all the leading nations of the West have scrambled forcefully and unashamedly to prop-up their economies using various intervention tools, the jury is certainly still out on a system that has brought more misery to many across the world than it has brought joy to a few.

Capitalism was not supposed to work at the mercy of government if truth must be told. Central to the capitalist doctrine is the assumption that there must be free entries and exists in the economic space, even as markets are supposed to be determined by their own inherent dynamics. Therefore, the failure of a giant financial house such as the Lehman Brothers which heralded the collapse of similar businesses across the world should have been viewed as part of the normal self-evolving and corrective processes of capitalism.

Capitalism, or any system of primitive accumulation for that matter, thrives in an environment that is not totally different from a de-facto Animal Kingdom. It has no room for sentiments even as predators must exist along a clearly defined food chain in which the weak are licensed to die almost as a rule!

And nowhere should that lessons of the global recession be more profound than in the so-called Third World, whose governments, for several decades, were lectured by the Bretton-Woods institutions on the need to unshackle their economies from heavy regulation by allowing market forces to determine the prices of almost everything except the dowries to be paid for new brides. Now, obviously, a more comprehensive usage would have to be found for the word 'bail-out'.

For the greater majority of Nigerians barely able to etch out a living stranded as they have always been on the outermost periphery of the global financial epicentres of the world, the obvious slow-down in the fight against corruption and institutional abuse experienced first, in the manner the Ribadu affair was handled; and second, the laughable conviction and optional conviction of the former Edo state governor Lucky Igbinedion for corruption, both of which are grounds for deep apprehension and sobriety as the New Year beckons.

Even before the global meltdown our economy was already in dire straits to say the least. Today rampaging unemployment has driven most of our youth to crime in their droves due to their social deprivation.

Today as we head into 2009, the price of oil which sold above 150 dollars per barrel only a few months ago has crashed below 40 dollars on a budget predicated on the product selling above 45 dollars! What that means, for sure, is that government's leaner purse is almost certainly result in harder times for millions of Nigerians already crying out for mercy in a system that has no semblance of social security.

But like the best prize-fighters, Nigerians have proven over the years that they are a resilient lot and can also take a hit. Whether they can wither the storm in one piece yet again in 2009 remains to be seen, but already the hint at severe austerity measures is a bad omen. It makes me sick to realize that in Europe part of the measures to battle recession is to get the people spending again by making credit even more accessible. Here the impetus is to invoke austerity measures without improving our living conditions. Still, a lot will depend on how Nigerians react to the performance of the government at the center and in the states as the new year progresses.

In 2009 there will be fewer margins for error in the conduct of our leaders at all levels. The poor have become even poorer faster than the rich became richer. In 2009 'the people' will be fully entitled to ask questions about the economic value of those long motorcades and ostentatious lifestyles that thrive like oasis in our oceans of poverty.

Next year, unless governments at different levels begin to implement programmes that will lessen the degree of excruciating poverty nationwide, the alarming insecurity in the land will worsen and the signs are already there for all to see in places like Ibadan. Therefore, 2009 should not be another year for seminars and conferences whose reports will end up on some dusty shelves in our government houses. I am tempted to believe that the capacity and ability of the people to deliver on some key aspects of the economy will be severely tested and the reason for that is quite simple:

2009 will be the year that the President and his governors must deliver on their campaign promises because the year 2010 will almost certainly be lost to the election campaigns for 2011! Unless we accept that the 2011 elections will be rigged like those of 2007 and 2003, President Umar Musa Yar'adua and his governors to prove their mettles next year. We must not settle for less because performance is what determines success or failure in civilized democracies the world over. Why must ours be different?

Now that the President is free from all legal handicaps, much will be expected from him in 2009. He will need to transform his 7-Point Agenda from the mere slogan that it is presently into the action programme he promised Nigerians. People want to see our public school system functioning properly once again. Expectations will be the same for the health sector.

There are other issues that need to be addressed for Nigerians to begin to make a meaningful existence. We must also tackle the cost of living because the greater majority of Nigerians are already on slave wages. A few examples will suffice at this point.

When the government increased the pump prices of petroleum products severally during the Obasanjo administration the move was tied to the high cost of the products in the international market along with the landing costs. Now that the prices of the same products have nose-dived globally, the government is yet to show enough courage by adjusting the prices locally to lessen the burden on Nigerians.

But why in all honesty should the government involve itself in the process at all given the reasons advanced for the deregulation of the downstream oil sector in the first place. Marketers of the same products in Europe and the Americas had no need to wait for their government to re-adjust their own prices to suit the prevalent oil gloom.

The situation clearly explains why I have always posited on these pages that the idea of a vibrant private sector to lead our economy to the promised-land is a non-starter because those who run the government and set the rules also own the former. To say that there is conflict of interests in high and low places in relationship between the private sector and officialdom will therefore be a huge understatement!

Let the government huff and puff over the matter, unless the private sector regains its credibility and begins to invest in the real sectors of the economy it cannot provide the kind of jobs we desire to mop our youths off the streets. In our single tracked economy where even the biggest conglomerates make superior profits from imports, greed has triumphed over common sense. Everyone prefers to be an importer. That explains why our economy remains trapped between pseudo-capitalism and an imperfect form of socialism. The mere declaration of austerity measures cannot solve such problems.

Much will also be expected in the performance of our governors in 2009, and to me, the yardstick surely is the way Mohammed Danjuma Goje has been able to transform Gombe state within the space of six years. I also wrote penultimate week that there much to admire in the effort and quality of work put in by Babatunde Fashola in Lagos. Great things are also expected this year from Zamfara state when most of the industries form its public-private partnerships come on stream. They should have a direct impact in reducing poverty.

That aside, few states have shown enough courage and commitment to fight poverty by creating the much needed synergy between the rural populace and the urban centers the way Governor Aliyu Magatakarda Wammako has attempted in his short time in office. The tragedy is that while the governor continues to focus on the development of the rural areas of his state, he must also keep a wary eye on the divisive antics of the Democratic Peoples Party [DPP] led by the former governor of the state Dalhatu Bafawara. He needs our prayers.

On that score I wish you all a happy and prosperous 2009!