…laments impacts of sabotage on the economy
The choice of President Bola Tinubu to take hard decisions in the interest of the country was necessary, considering the unenviable economic state the nation was when he took office about a year ago, Vice President Kashim Shettima has said.
Vice President Shettima was speaking on Thursday at the Second Chronicle Roundtable, held at the Continental Hotel, Abuja, giving reasons why the administration had to take actions on the petrol subsidy regime and the foreign exchange market intervention.
The Vice President who was the Guest Speaker at the event, also described the gloomy economy state when the Tinubu administration took charge, pointing out however that President Tinubu would rather take the harsh but surest route to the required recovery.
He implored Nigerians to be patient with the administration as the President steers the ship of state through the economic turbulence and storm he met on ground, expressing confidence that some of the measures being administered would soon bring desired results for the nation.
“Soon, Nigeria’s economy will experience significant growth once we’ve overcome these sacrifices. Positive changes will soon be evident across all economic indicators – inflation, per capita income, GDP numbers, poverty reduction, food security, and all aspects close to the hearts of our people.
“Leadership in a time of crisis is akin to standing in the hem of a ship going through a storm where the weight of everyone onboard rests upon your shoulders and the course your chart will shape the destiny of all who follow. In such moments, true leadership demands not only courage, but also the wisdom to forge on or abandon ship.
“His Excellency, President Bola Tinubu, chose the option that will save the life of the nation instead of one that will merely prolong its imminent and predicted economic death and we do not resort to putting the blame on the previous administration, leadership is about courage, leadership is about continuity, leadership is about taking far-reaching decisions.
“Before we took charge, the biggest elephant in the room was a question of the fuel subsidy removal. It was an albatross around the neck of the nation for the past 20 to 30 years. We understood why our predecessor made the decision to remove the subsidy, but there was no sufficient budget for it in the fiscal year.
“The year before we took office, Nigeria’s debt-service-to-revenue ratio had gone to 111.18%. The anticipated debt crisis may sound like fancy economic jargon to the man on the street, but I promise to have a meaningful conversation with you. But you and I are in a better position to understand how such miscalculations have played out in other countries, it’s an economic death sentence.
“In plain terms, our debt servicing was such that if you earn N100,000, the entirety of the money was not only paid to your debtor, you are forced to borrow an additional N11,800 to pay the debtor. How do you intend to survive this? … before you become a pariah. We are not even discussing the nation’s budget deficits, diversions of resources from critical sectors of the economy and corruption masterminded by subsidy regime.
“We had to get rid of the subsidy or the subsidy would get rid of the Nigerian nation. It was a bitter pill to swallow, but we had to do it and we know that the government is a continuum and whoever has succeeded the previous government would have either chosen to steer the ship through the storm as President Tinubu is doing, or jump ship and let the country implode.
“Fortunately, that’s a good reason some of our brothers and sisters who ran for this office were unable to question our methods. This was because whether in handling the subsidy matter or the FOREX crisis, we had also promised the solutions we had adopted. Those who attempted to eat their words were instantly proven wrong by data, history and the antecedents, those emotional reality checkers”, he explained.
He however lamented the level of sabotage that the nation’s economy had gone through in the hands of those he noted were only concerned with personal gains over national interest, particularly pointing at fuel subsidy beneficiaries and foreign currency speculators
“Our brothers in charge of the CBN Mr. Yemi Cardozo and the NSA, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, had to take matters into their hands to neutralize the overpowering influence of currency manipulators, who had conspired to frustrate our reforms.
“Today, I stand proud to say that their interventions have translated into desired results and Naira’s pushback against all odds is an inspiring journey that doesn’t have to be learned in Buenos Aires, as someone wanted us to do. They were projecting that the Naira will go to as high as 5000 to the dollars. Some betted against the Naira, some borrowed mercilessly from the banks and bought dollar at a cost of 2000 to the naira.
“I align myself fully with the position of Dr. Shamsudeen Usman; it’s sad, it’s disheartening, it’s befuddling that some of us do not wish the nation well, they’ll rather that the nation imports. Well let it be known to them, when the rain falls, it doesn’t fall on one man’s house”, he said.
He also reminded critics of the choice of the administration’s route to economic recovery that there is no one-size-fits-all solution to complexities facing individual nations, noting that every nation is forged out of its peculiar economic histories and contexts.
He cited the Argentine Solution suggested by the presidential candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the last election, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, noting that governance is not a photocopying machine.
“Sometime in February this year, a presidential candidate in the last election, eager to mock our economic trajectory, rushed to point Argentina as a model for Nigeria. An overnight free market specialist, he was convinced that we had missed our way and should have adopted the template of our friends in South America. In barely two weeks, he watched as Argentina’s inflation rates soared, yet refused to acknowledge that every country’s journey is different.
“Every country is a product of its economic history and context. We respect what President Javier Milei does there and we wish him well, but governance is not the photocopying machine some of us believe it is. When I speak about the contextuality and complexity of each country’s economy, I acknowledge the economic sabotage we have had to endure”, he said.
The Vice President told participants that Nigeria, which accounts for a quarter of Africa’s population and 75% of the GDP in West Africa, will determine how the continent eventually fares in determining global growth in the nearest future.
According to him, Nigeria needs to get its acts together first for it to lead Africa into its projected growth revolution because the shape of things in Nigeria will have a lot to do with how the black continent achieves its destiny.
“The trajectory of global growth is facing Africa and Nigeria will make or mar that transition. It’s in our interest, it’s in the interest of the black man, for Nigeria to succeed. One out of every four black men is a Nigerian and by 2050, Nigeria will surpass the United States, will be the third most populous nation on Earth, our population will hit 440 million and by the end of the century, when all of us here might have become poor tenants in the home of the earthworms, Nigeria will become the most populous nation on Earth.
“Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, though humbly it might be, there’s no place like home. We have to unite, we have to fuse into one. Politics is over, we are now in the phase of governance. We need to move this nation forward, not for my own sake, not for the sake of the people on the high table, but for the sake of the black man.
“They all look up to us. For political reasons, I don’t want to call citizenship, but the hope of the black man rests with the people of this country. 75% of the GDP of the West African sub-region is generated by Nigeria”, he said.
Earlier in his opening remarks, chairman of the Ministry of Finance Incorporated and former Finance Minister, Dr Shamsudeen Usman, praised the content of the Renewed Hope Agenda of the Tinubu administration, describing it as one of the most detailed and carefully crafted policy document in the history of the country.
He stressed the need for the Renewed Hope Agenda document to be reviewed and integrated into the medium and long-term development framework of the country, noting that policy consistency with a long-term vision to transform critical sectors of the economy, is the way to go.
Dr Usman also commended the administration’s establishment of a central coordination delivery unit to track the performance of programmes, policies and key interventions of the Federal Government, insisting that the monitoring of key performance indicators in the policy document was critical to the success of the government.
On his part, the CEO of 2nd Chronicle Newspaper, Malam Mahmud Jega had while welcoming guests to the event, said the need to critically analyse government policies and programmes was not just an expectation from the media but indeed borne out of the necessity to collectively contribute in shaping the nation’s development trajectory.
Also present at the event were the Minister of Information, Alhaji Mohammed Idris; Special Adviser to the President on Political Matters, Dr Hakeem Baba Ahmed; Chairman of 21st Century Chronicle, Amb. Gbara Awanen; notable leaders in the media industry, Dr Ishaq Moddibo Kawu; Mallam Garba Shehu; Mr Segun Adeniyi, and Malam Mahmud Jega, among others.
