Buhari’s policies at a glance
Economic diversification rimarily due to the economic challenges it claimed to have inherited, President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration opted for economic diversification. Citing the unprecedented fall in the global oil prices, Buhari has told the nation that it is time Nigeria moved away from an oil-dependent economy. In the last two years, the emphasis has been on solid minerals and agriculture both of which in 2016, according to the Presidency, grew by seven percent and 4.11 respectively. Presidency officials have put the contribution of the Ministry of Solid Minerals’ to the federation account at N2 billion in 2016 as against N700 million in 2015.
PTreasury Single Account (TSA)
In August 2015, Buhari declared his administration’s readiness to implement the Treasury Single Account (TSA) which was first introduced but not implemented by his predecessor in 2012. It is a unified structure of bank accounts enabling consolidation and optimal utilization of government’s cash resources. The administration believes that the TSA has helped block revenue leakages and saved N5.244 trillion as at February 10, 2017.
Social Investment Programme
On May 29 last year, Buhari officially unveiled his administration’s Social Intervention Programme, including the N-Power graduate job scheme, the home grown school feeding programme, the government enterprise and empowerment scheme as well as the conditional cash transfer. Buhari described the programme as “the most ambitious” in Nigeria’s history, expressing optimism that it would lift millions of Nigerians out of poverty and create the opportunity for people to fend for themselves. Budgeting N500 billion for the programme in 2016, said that his administration was committed to providing job opportunities for 500,000 Nigerians to work as teachers and employ 100,000 artisans across the nation.
“5.5 million children are to be provided with nutritious meals through our school feeding programme to improve learning outcomes, as well as enrolment and completion rates. The conditional cash transfer scheme will provide financial support for up to one million vulnerable beneficiaries, and complement the enterprise programme which will target up to one million market women; four hundred and sixty thousand artisans; and two hundred thousand agricultural workers nationwide.” Over N40 billion, according to the Presidency, has so far been released for the various branches of the Social Intervention Programme.
Ease of Doing Business
In August 2016, President Buhari inaugurated the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council. The council, among other things, is aimed at introducing a single form for company incorporation to save time and reduce cost, eliminating the need for small and medium enterprises to hire lawyers to prepare registration documents, integrating the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) e-payment solution with the Corporate Affairs Commission portal to facilitate e-stamping and simplifying visa on arrival process.
The National Economic Recovery and Growth Plan
With a view to getting the economy out of recession, Buhari, in April this year, unveiled the National Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (2017-2020) whose vision is to restore economic growth, invest in Nigerians, and to build a globally competitive economy. NERGP is aimed at stabilizing the macroeconomic environment, achieving agriculture and food security, ensuring energy efficiency, improving transportation infrastructure and driving industrialization through small and medium enterprises.
Micro, Small Enterprises Clinics and Medium
Vice President Yemi Osinbajo last January inaugurated the National MSMEs Clinics and Booklet to find solutions to problems militating against the speedy growth of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) in the country. He described it as part of government’s strategic commitments aimed at improving the business environment across the country. He said the clinics would also serve as one stop shop for dealing with various business concerns and approval issues. “It is evident that the MSMEs clinic must go round various states to key locations. So we have therefore brought together state governments and this will also help to give us and the regulatory agencies a better understanding and also enable the state government themselves to play a key role in assisting with facilitating the business of MSMEs”, Osinbajo said.
Anti-corruption war
The administration has demonstrated a strong commitment to the anti-corruption war. Apart from constituting the Professor Itse Sagayled Presidential Advisory Committee against Corruption mandated to advise his administration on the prosecution of the anti-graft war and the implementation of required reforms in the nation’s criminal justice system, Buhari also sent to the Senate the Money Laundering [Prevention and Prohibition] Bill 2016 and the Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Bill 2016 Bill in order to lend credence to his anti-graft crusade. The administration has laid claims to recovery of funds and assets stolen by past government officials.
In April, Buhari suspended Secretary to the Government of the Federation Babachir Lawal and Director General of the National Intelligence Agency, Ayo Oke, for alleged financial fraud and constituted a three-man panel headed by Osinbajo to investigate them. Babachir was investigated for alleged violations of law and due process in the award of contracts under the Presidential Initiative on the North East while Oke was probed for the $43.4 million stashed away at a residential apartment at Osborne Towers, Ikoyi, Lagos State. The report of the investigation is, however, yet to be made public.
Assets Recovery
President Buhari, in 2016, set up the inter-agency Presidential Committee on Asset Recovery (PCAR) headed by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, to bring together all law enforcement agencies involved in the recovery of assets, as part of efforts towards strengthening the fight against corruption. The committee has the mandate to coordinate the collation and categorisation of recovered asset from 2015-2016; verify the records and status of physical assets such as buildings recovered under previous administration; set up the framework for management of recovered stolen assets to avoid re-looting and mismanagement of asset as was the experience in the past; create asset register for recovered asset to avoid a situation where former or serving public officers carry away government assets
Whistleblower policy
Last December, the Federal Government unveiled a new anticorruption policy, the whistleblower policy which provides for up to five percent reward for whistleblowers that expose fraud in both public and private sectors. The new policy is aimed at encouraging anyone with information about a violation or misconduct that impacts negatively on Nigerians and government to report it; increasing exposure of financial or finance related crimes; improving the level of public confidence in public entities; enhancing transparency and accountability in the management of public funds; improving Nigeria’s open Government Ranking and Ease of Doing Business Indicators as well as recovering public funds that can be deployed to finance Nigeria’s infrastructure deficit. The Presidency has said that this policy, within its first two months of operation, yielded about $160 million and N8 billion in recoveries of stolen funds.
Through the policy, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) discovered $9.8m in a Kaduna building owned by a former Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Andrew Yakubu as well as $43.3 million and other currencies at Osborne Towers in Lagos which the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) has laid claim to.
The Federal Government has commenced a mechanism of extending the whistle blower policy to illegal weapons’ possession by politicians and other public figures. Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, said this was aimed at exposing those keeping deadly arms for communal violence and sinister political motives.