• Warns AI could also be one other booby lure of the West towards growing international locations
James Sowole in Abeokuta
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo yesterday declared that debt was worse than leprosy as a result of whereas leprosy destroyed just one individual, debt destroyed generations.
He made the comment whereas questioning how Nigeria amassed its debt and the influence of the nation’s financial choices through the years.
“And for anybody to say that debt is no leprosy is absolute nonsense. Debt is worse than leprosy because leprosy destroys only one person, whereas debt destroys generations,” he mentioned.
“How did we get ourselves into this trap? Can AI help us?”
Obasanjo additionally warned that Artificial Intelligence (AI) could be one other booby lure of the West towards growing international locations.
The former president acknowledged this whereas talking on the Ajibosin 3.0 Symposium, held on the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, Abeokuta, Ogun State.
The symposium, with the theme, “Leveraging Artificial Intelligence to Solve Grassroots Problems and Accelerate National Development”, drew audio system from lecturers, policymakers, politicians and different stakeholders, and featured discussants who warned Nigerians towards uncontrolled publicity to AI functions.
Obasanjo, who particularly picked on the lead presentation of the Convener and Founder of the League of Northern Democrats (LND), which dwelt on historic views of AI, admitted that he didn’t know an excessive amount of technically concerning the topic.
He mentioned, “I don’t know too much technically about AI, but I know that anything that is not under your control can be abused against you. You can therefore understand why, in his statement, Dr. Umar Addo approached the subject from a historical perspective.”
Quoting Ardo, Obasanjo mentioned, “Look, these items they name AI, I’m taking a look at them from a historic standpoint. Everything that has been packaged and properly offered to us from the West has all the time turned out to be a booby lure.
“He was not discussing what AI is or what it isn’t. Others had spoken about that. His level was that now we have seen this sample earlier than. We have been packaged as commodities.
“First, there was the slave commerce. Then they got here again and launched what they referred to as legit commerce. That was colonialism. After that got here overseas direct funding, accompanied by the requirement that we pay for expertise switch. But what precisely is expertise switch? Who transferred expertise to them, and what did they pay for it?
“Then got here globalisation, which, in sensible phrases, meant that we opened our doorways, they took all the things in our homes, after which closed their very own doorways.
“At one other level, they got here again and informed us that we couldn’t do something with out sure situations. I consider the World Bank launched it. Yes, Structural Adjustment. We didn’t have the mandatory buildings, but they got here up with structural adjustment.
“Now, take into account these items. I as soon as sat with somebody like the previous Prime Minister of Britain, James Callaghan. He was a sheep farmer and obtained 4 euros each year for each sheep he owned. Yet we have been informed that we mustn’t ever subsidise agriculture.
“We have been warned that if we subsidised agriculture, we might not obtain loans from the World Bank or the IMF.
“The World Bank and the IMF weren’t designed for us. They have been established earlier than we grew to become unbiased. Yet these are the establishments that decide what we should always do.
“We have good younger women and men who attended Ivy League universities, Oxford, Cambridge and different prestigious establishments. My kids attended a few of these universities too. One went to Cornell, one of many Ivy League universities.
“But how can somebody who has not managed a house inform me tips on how to run mine?
“These good younger women and men package deal their concepts in spectacular educational language, current them to us, and we settle for them lock, inventory and barrel. We then proceed to implement them.
“In a rustic of 250 million individuals, we permit younger women and men who might not even be married, not to mention have expertise managing a family, to inform us tips on how to handle our individuals and our nation. We swallow their prescriptions, and within the course of, we destroy ourselves.
“When I began my farm 47 years in the past, one naira was value 1 greenback and 85 cents. That was 47 years in the past. What has Nigeria executed in these 47 years that has introduced us to a scenario the place one greenback is now value 1,500 naira?
“What have we executed? What do our leaders know, and what do they not know? Of what they know, what can they really do for us?
“We have 24 million Nigerian kids who must be in class however should not. If you’re searching for the disasters of tomorrow, these kids characterize one in every of them.
“What can AI do for us in this regard? Can AI help us identify the types of food and crops we should produce and ensure that we produce them adequately and in sufficient quantities to achieve food and nutrition security?
“Can AI help us improve healthcare delivery? Can AI help us in the production of drugs?
“I believe these are the kinds of questions we should be asking. We want AI to help us at the grassroots level.
“And I believe that if we are masters of our own homes, particularly in matters concerning AI, we will be able to make AI do for us what we want it to do.”
