Indigenization and the Rise of the Technocomprador in the Nigerian Pharmaceutical Industry: A Conceptual Statement

Abstract

The illusions and failures that greeted the hopes and promises of political dependence engendered a new post-independence transition programme the fashioning of a successor economy, controlled by the local triad of indigenous investors, indigenous managers and successor state. The study of the policy of indigenization programme in the context of the pharmaceutical industry reveals that the indigenization of ownership and management in the sub-sector has failed to transfer the desired control to local actors. The paper concludes that the emergence of a techno-comprador in place of the technostructure found in the Northern hemispheric industry exposes the philosophical and intellectual poverty of Nigeria’s programme of indigenization.