As the Federal Government strives to improve the economic fortunes of the country, Acting President Yemi Osinbajo has warned that excuses will no longer be acceptable in the implementation of the Economic and Recovery Growth Plan.
The Acting President said this on Thursday at the cabinet retreat on ERGP implementation and 2018 budget preparation, according to a statement by his Senior Special Assistant Mr Laolu Akande.
His comments followed a speech by Dr Idris Jala, a former Malaysian government official, who was the guest speaker at the retreat.
Describing the speech as beyond motivational, Professor Osinbajo said, “The challenge is this, the discipline to be unreasonable in our targets and objectives. The discipline of attending the labs diligently and accepting to be locked in a room for as long as it takes to iron out what it is that needs to be done.
“I like the point also that Dr Jala made that the excuse that it won’t work here, the Nigerian factor, or some say exceptionalism or the acceptance of failure before you even start is certainly not tenable anymore.”
According to the Acting President, there is the need for those at the retreat and everyone with a role to play to stay positive and be determined to succeed.
“We simply have to accept that there is nothing Nigerian about failure, because as we know in our personal lives, failure and success are commodities on offer to everyone all over the world and every individual and every country makes a choice of which to buy and I will say on our behalf that we will choose success,” he said.
President Muhammadu Buhari had launched the ERGP on April 5 this year as part of his administration’s efforts to get the country out of recession and position it to achieve seven percent growth by 2020.
Among other things, the ERGP focuses on agriculture; ensuring food security, industrialisation and social investment.