And there was also the argument about who was actually getting the dollars? Either the privileged people or those connected to the regulators. So we needed to clean it up, and ensure we know what we are targeting. You may not have a situation where the black market and the official rates are exactly the same, but it can’t be a difference of almost double. Therefore, there was the need to streamline. Most manufacturers were getting their forex from the black market, and their cost of doing business was being affected. It wasn’t even available to the common people.
And so it wasn’t helping anybody, including the economy, and to worsen the issue, there was even scarcity. So I can sit in my house, find a way to get it at N450, sell it at N750 and make my money. The difference between the official and the black market rate was so huge, and what that tells you is that it’s not sustainable. And so from what we have seen in the last couple of weeks, with the subsidy going off, and with everybody now thinking ‘what can we do differently?’ there seems to be an upturn, a kind of positive spin with things in the economy. So, it wasn’t benefitting anybody, but was rather depressing the economy.
Besides, it was clear that corruption was beginning to jump in, to muddle up the waters. But we could see that they were not helpful for us at all because in the longer term, we were not seeing the development that we were hoping to see and achieve in the bigger economy. Unfortunately, petroleum subsidy has become an emotional issue for Nigeria, because there is this sense that ‘oh, we are oil producers, why should we pay more? Why should we struggle?’ So, in the short term, it would appear that the lower prices were fine with everybody. For instance, when the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) was signed, we were hoping that fuel subsidy would be outdated very quickly, but the government then wasn’t quiet eager to do that. The economy had been bleeding for too long, and it was important that they took action on the things that we’ve been talking about. But they are changes that are required to ensure that the economy begins to grow. These are things that are not always pleasant to change things people will not accept quickly, or gladly. I think there has been many shifts from where we were in the past, and I am glad that a lot of things that we’ve been talking about at the chamber over the years, we’ve seen them change. What’s your general assessment of the new administration?
#Shift admin turn off shifts available for trade series#
Many Nigerians have described President Bola Tinubu’s administration as starting on a high note, especially with the series of its policy pronouncement in the last few weeks. In this chat with AKIN ADEWAKUN, the Director General, Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Dr Chinyere Almona, bares her mind on the state of the nation’s economy, the ongoing reforms of the new government and why such reforms have become imperative.
0 kommentar(er)
