The Economics, Politics and Law of Infrastructure Financing in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Critical Tertium Comparationis CTC

Sometime around 2012, an investigative news outlet published a special report regarding its findings about the number of abandoned projects in Nigeria. In its preliminary findings it was discovered that about 12000 projects were abandoned due to reason largely ascribed to lack of political will and largely, corruption. Fast forward to 2021, a report by the Nigerian Institute of Quantity Surveyors put the figure of abandoned projects to a staggering 56000, the sum of which valued at N12 trillion (that is $2.7 billion). This menace is not peculiar to Nigerian alone. In the North-western part of South Africa alone, projects worth R1 billion as of 2020 and the figures remains ever increasing. In Kenya, a report by the World Bank in 2020 revealed that over 500 projects have become white elephant, which worth Sh9 trillion. From Ghana’s STX Building Project worth $10 billion to Kenya’s Lamu Coal Power Plant. From the 12Km Moonlight rail worth 50 billion) in Rivers State Nigeria to Zambia’s Mongu proposed 20000-capacity stadium, the list of abandoned project continues surging in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) region. While different factors have been identified as the reasons for project abandonment cum infrastructure gap in SSA, one word has always been used to sum it all, and that is, the risk factor (economic, political and legal), which of course has invariably been pinned down as the cause of financing deficit, refinancing issue, repayment conundrum cum infrastructural gap in Saharan Africa (SSA). In view of this, this research took a novel approach to addressing the menace of project abandonment, finance deficit, refinancing cum infrastructural gap in SSA by deconstructing this malaise within the prisms of the trio, economics, politics and law. Drawing from preliminary research that I carried out, over a short period of time, I tactically deployed four distinct economics theories to philosophise A3S as a four-wheel factor which were identified as pivotal towards formulating a model that can be used to tackle, head-on, the menace of financing deficit, infrastructure gap and financing sustainability in SSA. The A3S pillars are: affordability, accessibility, accountability and sustainability, codenamed (A3S) in this research. The A3S was considered as an overarching benchmark to reviewing the existing literature about infrastructure financing in SSA, I subsequently philosophised a feasible formula in economics that can be adopted as a principal formula that can be used for tackling the question of financing deficit and infrastructure dearth. Through synthetic but an in-depth literature review, it was discovered that a negligible or terse attention is given to the concepts of affordability, accessibility, accountability and sustainability when intellectually and practically confronting the malaise of infrastructure financing and delivery in SSA. According to the World Bank on data relating to Public-Private Partnership, SSA consists of 48 countries, therefore, I considered this reasonably too big to cover, hence the adoption of sampling, that is focusing on 3 of the most vibrant economies in each of the western, eastern and southern regions of Africa. Through a unique mixed-method and methodology, this thesis identifies and proves that the sampled countries cannot afford the repayment of the rising loans that are contracted all in the guise of financing infrastructure. Also, that Africa’s infrastructure gap requires huge financial investments and access to such funds in not realistically feasible to generate through local financial institutions. That the tenet of accountability is bastardised and it’s too susceptible to manipulation in favour of the political elite in the sampled states in SSA. Lastly, it is construed that for the financing deficit and infrastructural gap to be bridged, the parameters identified as fiscal gauge of affordability must be economically construed, the procedure for measuring accessibility must be institutionalised, and the mandate of validating adherence to accountability must revert to the citizenry (principal) on whose behalf the government (agent) negotiate for financing. It is in the light of this proposition that I philosophised a general but feasibly financing and sustainability model or economics formula that is feasible as a measure to the affordability, accessibility, accountability and sustainability gauges that can be used to measure financing strength of a borrowing country for sustainability in financing and development.