President Muhammadu Buhari has blamed his administration’s huge borrowing and poor performance on the Russia-Ukraine war, coronavirus pandemic and global financial crisis.
He also blamed insurgency as part of the problems that hampered his administration’s poor performance.
The president, who disclosed this while inaugurating the Dangote Refinery and Petrochemicals plants in Lagos State, South West Nigeria, expressed hope that the facility with the capacity to process 650,000 barrels per day of crude would enable the country to achieve self-sufficiency in the refined product and export surplus to the global market.
He said, “Our economy which is being stressed for many decades by huge deficits in economic infrastructure and over a decade of insurgency has also been impacted by several external crises including the global financial crisis – the collapse of the oil prices, covid-19 and Russia/Ukraine war.
“The consequences of these challenges constitute a severe strain in our economy limiting the Government’s ability to provide basic infrastructure without resulting in huge borrowings. Our Government therefore, took the decision to focus on creating an enabling environment for the private sector to thrive and fill the enormous gap in investment not only in infrastructure but also in all critical sector sectors.”
President Buhari, however, noted his administration recognised that without active participation of the private sector and strong commitment to public-private partnership, the country’s economy will continue to nosedive and impede economic growth.
He noted that the government should continue to provide an enabling environment and encourage innovative public-private partnership in all sectors of our economy. “Our administration has demonstrated its commitment to this in many areas such as executive orders 007 of 2019 which facilitated that.”
While commending the Chairman of Dangote group of industries, Aliko Dangote for always putting the country on the map through his bold visionary and courageous investment in key Industries, Buhari noted that the completion of the refinery was notable milestone “on our economy and a game changer for the downstream petroleum product market, not only for Nigeria but to the entire African continent.”
He, however, advocated the unity of Africa in order to achieve the goal of agenda 2063, adding that “we must integrate our economies, eliminate various threats and energise our youthful population to scale up our protective capacity.
“We must create necessary conditions for our private sector to grow and partner with the Public sector to accelerate economic growth across the continent. We must not allow outside powers to choose some of our leaders to destabilize our economy and our political trajectory.”
Meanwhile, the occasion was graced by four African Presidents; Nana Akufo-Addo of Ghana; Niger Republic’s Mohamed Bazoum; Togo’s Faure Gnassingbé and Senegal’s Macky Sall; while the Chadian president was represented.
