The Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprises (CPPE) has set an economic agenda for the incoming administration aimed at signaling investors’ confidence and repositioning the Nigerian economy.
CPPE Founder, Dr. Muda Yusuf, in a statement on Sunday in Lagos, said Nigeria’s current political transition offered a great opportunity to chart a new course and redirect the country’s economy.
Sen. Bola Tinubu emerged as President-elect of the country at the Presidential election on Feb. 25.
According to Yusuf, Nigeria’s economy is in a stumbling and fragile state and in dire need of a new direction.
He suggested that the incoming administration should establish quality economic governance consistent with tested economic principles and empirical evidence, contextualized within socioeconomic peculiarities.
This, he stressed, was critical from the onset of the administration to signal investors’ confidence.
Yusuf added that a good economic governance framework should entail the setting up of a technically sound transition committee on the economy to provide policy direction and urgent reforms within one month.
He emphasized the need for a competitive economic environment with a level playing field and minimum monopoly dominance.
“They should expand the role of markets for value delivery, boost private enterprise, carry out a robust review of economic framework and engage in regular stakeholder engagement to ensure proper alignment of policies with investors sentiments.
“Government institutions that play technical roles should be headed by tested technocrats,” he said.
Yusuf advocated the need for the incoming administration to prioritize macroeconomic stability with an emphasis on moderating inflationary pressures, stabilizing the exchange rate, and boosting economic growth.
He added that tax reforms, and fuel and foreign exchange subsidy elimination to save N7 trillion and N3 trillion respectively were pertinent.
“Nigeria must unlock more income from revenue generating agencies through enhanced efficiency of their operations and initiate budget reforms to ensure fiscal discipline, curb budget padding among others.
“The administration must also ensure value for money in government expenditure and procurement and commit to a reduction in the cost of governance,” he said.
He tasked the incoming administration to demonstrate unmistakable commitment to the implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) to attract more investment into the oil and gas sector.
He added that the current impressive momentum to tackle oil theft should be sustained and the practice of the President assuming the role of Minister of Petroleum should be discontinued.
Yusuf said that trade and tariff reforms should include a tariff regime that adequately protected local industries, to facilitate industrialization.
He added that import duty on intermediate products and critical industrial inputs should be reviewed to reduce production costs adding that tariff review processes should be more inclusive and transparent.
He called for the removal of all customs checkpoints within the country, saying that the practice of intercepting cargo that has been duly cleared at any of our ports should be discontinued.
The CPPE boss said that policies on agriculture must be holistic, focusing on the entire value chain.
He stressed that due attention should be given to the cost and availability of inputs, production and productivity, application of technology, logistics and marketing, processing, and storage.
Yusuf noted the urgent need to transition from subsistence farming to mechanized and commercial agriculture, driven by technology.
“There is a need to attract the youth into agriculture as the farming population is rapidly aging and this would only happen if the sector is technology driven.
“Nigeria must strengthen the linkage between agriculture and industry within a sustainable backward integration framework,” he said.
