Financial experts in the country have scored Nigeria low in economic performance as the country celebrates its 63rd independence anniversary.
The experts, who spoke to The PRIMANEWS, advised the government on the need to introduce initiatives that would revamp the economy and boost confidence in the sector.
The Registrar/Chief Executive Officer, National Institute of Credit Administration, Prof. Chris Onalo, said Nigeria’s economy is a work-in-progress, and anything that is in progress can experience ups and downs.
While being optimistic about the country, he said the country needed to move from the old paradigm, which gave a glimmer of hope that there was light in the process of getting to where it was going to get to.
Emphasising the essence of a credit driven economy, he said, “As a credit economy, I want to see the economy, post 63 years of Nigeria, becoming credit driven, which will impact on the character of Nigerians, so that Nigeria will have its own world view positively; a people that are integrity minded, that can be trusted, whose words are sacrosanct, a country that can sit comfortably, that can sit honourably with other nations of the earth.”
A former President, Association of National Accounts of Nigeria, Dr Sam Nzekwe, said there was no significant improvement in the economy as there was still instability in the value of the local currency.
He noted that the naira exchange rate was still around 766/$ at the official market, and about 1,000/$ at the parallel market.
Manufacturers and other importers, he noted, were still grappling with challenges in getting foreign exchange to enhance their operations.
He decried insecurity which had continued to threaten businesses and kick farmers out of their farms.
Nzekwe said, “The government should think of how to create enabling environment for businesses to thrive; they should remove kidnappers from the system to boost security and businesses and farmers who go to farm. No investor will like to go and invest in a place where he will go and die.”
He said it was important to boost production in the economy because there was low production in the country generally.
It was also important for the government to cut cost of government which was too high, he said.
The Deputy-President of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Gabriel Idahosa, described Nigeria’s economic journey over the course of the past 63 years as one that was characterised by policy inconsistencies.
He added that political instability, largely themed by military interventions played a huge contributory role in the setbacks that have bedevilled the Nigerian economy over the years.
Idahosa’s argument was hinged on the fact that the 1966 coup, which produced the military government of late Aguiyi Ironsi, led to the discard of the independence constitution which gave the regions political and economy autonomy, as opposed to the strict federal structure of governance that we have today.
Idahosa said, “At 63 one should be considered old enough, that’s assuming the growth was a normal growth, but unfortunately we had a lot of political rough rides. We have had continuous policy sommersaults and going back to square one when a new government comes in. Everyone will agree that we have performed far below expectation.
“There are countries that were lower than Nigeria in 1960, like South Korea, Indonesia, even Mexico. They are all far ahead of Nigeria now by all economic indices. In terms of expectations, we haven’t lived up to our expectations, what is important now is if we have learnt sufficiently from the experiences of the past to now apply them and achieve rapid growth.”
On his part, the Chief Executive Officer of the Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise, Muda Yusuf, noted that over the past six decades, the Nigerian economy had transformed from a basically agrarian economy to an economy driven largely by services and oil and gas.
While noting that the Nigerian economy had recorded an average growth performance over the past decades although with a few instances of sluggish growth, Yusuf expressed concern that the challenge of creating an inclusive growth trajectory remained a major concern.
He said, “The country’s macroeconomic management framework continues to pose serious challenges to investors in the economy. This situation has been further compounded by the shocks and disruptions inflicted by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the lingering effects of the covid-19 pandemic.
“The fragile macroeconomic conditions remain a major cause for concern. The troubling macroeconomic situation have manifested in the following ways in recent years: weak and depreciating currency, high inflationary pressure, high and rising debt profile, exchange rate volatility, liquidity crisis in the foreign exchange market, increasing fiscal deficit, growing debt service burden, and the acceleration of money supply growth following the rising CBN financing of deficit.”