Nigeria’s Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, says activities of the Niger Delta militants are the reasons the country is in its current state of recession.
Professor Osinbajo believes that no country can lose one million barrels of oil per day without suffering tremendously.
Nigeria’s economy had slipped into recession after a report of the National Bureau of Statistics showed that the nation’s GDP contracted by 2.06% in the second quarter of 2016.
The report came just as militant activities have resurged in the Niger Delta, causing the revenue of the nation which comes largely from crude oil sales to drop.
The price of crude, which had dropped in the international market, already taking its toll on the nation’s economy was compounded by the attacks on oil installations in the Niger Delta.
Peculiar Circumstances
The Vice President pointed out that Nigeria could only get out of recession by looking at only those solutions that would take full consideration of Nigeria’s peculiar circumstances and composition.
At a quarterly business briefing at the Presidential Villa with private sector stakeholders on Monday, the Vice President said Nigeria could not afford the usual error of generalisation and speculations that would not take the country out of recession.
The presidential quarterly business forum, which has in attendance the ministers of budget, finance, trade and industry and captains of industries, is part of efforts to tackle headlong, the economic recession.
The Vice President told the gathering that power, security in the Niger Delta region and improved business environment among important things must be addressed in the short term.
Set To Inject Funds
The recession notwithstanding, the Finance Minister, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, said Nigeria would borrow to pump into the economy for capital projects even as she insisted that interest rates must be reduced.
The Minister had few days ago said the government was set to inject an additional 350 billion Naira ($1.1 billion) into the economy and raise $1 billion from Euro-bonds by mid-December to ease the recession.
She had told reporters in Abuja that the additional funding, on top of the initial 420 billion Naira released in May, was primarily for capital expenditure projects that would also involve support from local banks and transaction partners.
“We are raising money. As you know the Euro-bond capital raise is on.
“We are about to appoint advisers so we we will be raising additional $1 billion.
“Two weeks ago we approved the external borrowing plan and that was very important,” the Minister said.
While local investors feel neglected despite being in greater majority than the foreign investors for which the government is looking to attract back to Nigeria, the Minister for Budget, Senator Udoma Udoma, has reassuring words.
“We are determined to make it easier to do business in Nigeria and we believe that, working together with the private sector, we must surely transform this economy,” he told the gathering.
