The Economy Could Get Worse, Warns El-Rufai
Ambode: Foreign exchange crisis won’t last forever
Gboyega Akinsanmi
John Shiklam
Kaduna State Governor, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, yesterday said the challenging economic conditions facing the country could get worse.
But his Lagos State, counterpart, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode, has said the foreign exchange crisis currently undermining the Nigerian domestic economy would soon become a history.
The two governors spoke at separate events in their respective states.
El-Rufai who spoke at the Government House, Kaduna, last Tuesday night at a dinner in honour of the top 15 people who emerged at the Crowd Sourcing Competition organised by the state government, said the situation looks scary.
He however said rather than succumb to panic, Nigerians should seize the opportunity to do away with the era of easy money and rent-seeking, to a new economy that is powered by the intellect, enterprise and the hardwork.
El-Rufai said the competition was organised to solicit the input of ordinary people in developing the State Development Strategy, 20162020, stressing that development planning is a serious matter that should not be left in the hands of certified experts alone.
He declared that the determination of his administration to make Kaduna State great again remains abiding and fresh.
“We hope that you will maintain your commitment to the future growth and prosperity of Kaduna State.
“On our part, we would encourage the line ministries to discuss further with you on the laudable ideas you have suggested. The government will inscribe your names as contributors to our forthcoming state development plan. You have earned it!
“Let me at this juncture remind us that the challenging economic conditions our country is facing could yet get worse. It is scary, but rather than succumb to panic paralysis, let us seize the opportunity we are presented to remake our country away from the era of easy money and rent-seeking, to a new economy that is powered by the intellect, the enterprise and the hardwork of all citizens.
“That is why we have put education, health, agriculture, jobs and security at the heart of our governance agenda. We are expanding access to education because we believe that our people’s potential can be realised only when we give every child decent basic education,” the governor said.
He added that education, health, agriculture, jobs and security remained the top priority of his administration.
However, Ambode, a public finance specialist, canvassed structural adjustment of the Nigerian domestic economy as an essential step to strengthen Naira against foreign currencies.
The Lagos State governor, in a statement issued by his Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Habib Aruna, after a meeting with the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of Nigerian Breweries Plc, Mr. Nicolas Verveld and some of the senior management staff members at Lagos House, Ikeja, said the foreign exchange crisis plaguing the country which resulted in the unprecedented depreciation of naira “is solvable, though we must look inward and start to embrace massive local manufacturing of products and local ownership of businesses.”
He said the deficiency which Nigeria is currently experiencing in the economy was a pointer to the fact that all hands should be on deck “to carry out some kind of structural adjustment on the economy and encourage the manufacturing of products needed by Nigerians in Nigeria.”
Ambode said the Nigerian Breweries has shown a very good example of encouraging local ownership of businesses, especially with the transformation of Lagos Breweries of the company to a totally Nigerian outfit, urging other foreign investors in the country to look toward such direction.
The governor commended the strategies adopted so far by President Muhammadu Buhari to address the challenges confronting the economy, thereby soliciting the support of all Nigerians to ensure the success of the current efforts of the federal government.
He said: “The issues at stake are more about a short term deficiency that we are experiencing in the economy. We do not believe that the issue of foreign exchange will last forever.
“It is something that is solvable but then, it is a pointer to the fact that there has to be some kind of structural adjustment in this economy. Everybody has to start to look inward.
“The Lagos breweries of the Nigerian Breweries Plc is a hundred percent Nigerian outfit. It is the kind of examples that we expect from businesses to ensure that we start to create a structure that allows Nigerians to own businesses by ourselves and do things that are made in Nigeria so that we can free up as much as possible the forex that we demand all the time.”