Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun, has told Nigerians not to expect to reap the benefits of the economic reforms by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu now as the administration is assiduously working on how to stabilise the economy and strengthen foreign exchange for productive activities.
Edun, who spoke during the virtual 2023 Annual Directors’ Conference of the Chartered Institute of Directors (CIoD) Nigeria, on Thursday, said that outside having a stable economy, the focus of the government is for the economy to grow “more than population growth, with low inflation, stable foreign exchange to enable investments in productive activities.”
He never mentioned ameliorating the sufferings of Nigerians who are under the yoke of his strangulating economic policies but insisted that the benefits of the policies would take an unstated time to materialise.
Nigerians have been grappling with hardship since Tinubu removed fuel subsidy and attempted to unify the official and parallel markets’ exchange rates.
Also, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) collapsed the multiple official market rates to the investors and exporters (I&E) window and it adopted the ‘willing buyer, willing seller’ model.
Consequently, the removal of subsidy on petrol has led to a surge in the cost of petrol, while the naira has devalued significantly against the dollar in the official and parallel markets.
Defending Tinubu’s reforms, Edun said the economic adjustments were pertinent and their benefits would take some time to materialise.
“The economic reforms are necessary; its benefits will take some time to materialise…”
“The agenda is to provide first and foremost a stable economy, growing more than population growth, with low inflation, stable foreign exchange to enable investments in productive activities.
“This is what the president is working on and we are a work in progress and we look forward to the task at hand.
“The big price is to make ourselves a formidable economy, our institutions a corporate governance place so that those interested in investing can have trust in their investment.
“The IoD has a major role to play in championing corporate governance so we have a clean lead corporate sector which the world can come and partner for growth and progress.”
