FG’s Policies Not Working Because Nigeria’s Economy Is Not Stable – Hon Mohammed
A member of the House of Representatives from Kazaori federal constituency in Jigawa State, Rt.Hon Architect Mohammed Muktar Kazaori, speaks with NASSNEWS on the state of Nigeria’s economy
NASSNEWS: can we meet you sir?
HONOURABLE MOHAMMED: Okay, I am Rt.Hon Architect Mohammed Muktar Kazaori, a member of the House of Representatives, from Kazaori federal constituency and I am from Jigawa State
NASSNEWS: What are your views about the economic situation of the country and the way forward?
HONOURABLE MOHAMMED: Our economy is crumbling every day. Due to certain factors, particularly our trial by error policies. The surgeons of the economy don’t have good policies to adopt in order to move the nation forward and achieve economical growth. So, this is a problem actually. Nigeria has reached a stage where policies might not work properly, Policies work in countries where their economy is stable, and they are doing well. Here, our economy had worsened in the last 10 years. We have two things on ground, The first is our lack of production. Once a nation is not producing for export and local consumption, the economy of such country, usually crumbles. This is because such nation cannot determine the market forces. At the moment in our country, it is the market that determines the prices of our goods and services.
Secondly, our currency also keeps going down because of the debts we have incurred through foreign loans and borrowing that we normallyget from the World Bank. They lenders determine the market forces, they determine how much we would sell your petrol how much we’re going to buy it. They know it is from our excess crude oil that we get the dollars that we would use to sustain the country.
So, there is a problem in that aspect. The solution is that we have to revive our refineries so that instead of us to export crude and import refined oil, we would export crude and still refine here. When we refine our petroleum products here, we will be able to determine how we’re going to sell, and the price we are going to sell it.
Everything is actually tied to production. We cannot determine how much we would buy the refined petrol abroad. It will be determined by the sellers. So you can see this is another problem.
NASSNEWS: Let’s talk about food security
HONOURABLE MOHAMMED: In terms of food security, there are a lot of hiccups in our policies. There is no sensible country that gives out huge sums of money in billions as palliatives to their people except if there is any pandemic. We are not in a pandemic. There is hunger everywhere, so what you should do is to subsidize food items. Look for food vendors and the major grain producers, sit with them and find out the cost. Ask them what is responsible for the high cost of foodstuff and what they need as support from government. Grant them tax holiday or wavers if need be. By the time there is understanding and incentives from government, prices of food items would drop.
How can you have a population of about 200 million Nigerians and you are distributing palliative to just 12 million? What happens to the remaining 188 million people? To worsen the situation , the distribution is not being transparently done. The problem started when NNPCL was formed as a limited liability company and it stopped remitting proceeds of sale to the Central Bank of Nigeria.
NASS NEWS: What’s your opinion about the Niger State Government barring sale of food items outside the state?
HONOURABLE MOHAMMED: We are all Nigerians, no state can exist in isolation. I don’t think that policy is a good one. Being a state that is rich in agricultural produce, the best thing is to encourage more young men to take to farming and give them support so that they would have enough produce to sell and mmake more money to increase their IGR. There is low production at the moment because of insecurity. As government , we need to address this problem squarely by practical approach instead of bringing further hardship on the people through drastic policies.
NASSNEWS: The Emir of Kano asked President Bola Tinubu’s wife to tell her husband that there is hunger in the land. What’s your comment on that?
HONOURABLE MOHAMMED: Yes. Kano is a volatile state because of the huge population. Majority of the youths are not employed because there is no work and they are hungry. People in northern Nigeria have more children because their religion allow them to marry more than one wives. Hence the population is huge. So, the Emir is merely trying to avert crisis that could be caused due to hunger.
NASSNEWS: The President Bola Tinubu administration has started implementing the Oronsaye Report. What’s your opinion about that?
HONORABLE MOHAMMED: It is a good thing because government is trying to reduce cost of governance to the barest minimum. It is a good policy whose implementation is long overdue.
NASSNEWS: Do you think that the President should reintroduce subsidy to lessen the suffering of the people?
HONOURABLE MOHAMMED: Subsidy removal is good but wrongly timed. Even now government is paying subsidy because of the pressure on the dollar.So actually, through the window, subsidy still remains. So you can see,That’s what I’m saying policies have been implemented just haphazardly in Nigeria. The President have to study what is happening before he adopt any policy. You have to study that. So you know, in government, it’s hard to reverse mistakes. it is hard to say subsidy should return. It’s already there, People don’t know yet because things are going up. So the government wouldn’t want to bring more hardship to its people by telling them to pay more for fuel.
NASSNEWS: can you see APC winning again with your performance so far?
HONOURABLE MOHAMMED:: Insha Alla. The reason why I say inshallah is that we believe in the people. It’s not the northerners Nigerians are angry, we are at the helms of affairs. We cannot shy away from our responsibilities. it’s a collective responsibility for everybody to see that Nigeria is moving towards a path of success not disintegration. People are not happy because things are very expensive in the market but the government is doing everything possible to address the situation. I will tell Nigerians to exercise a little patience, Rome was not built in a day. You cannot just wake up and become London. There are challenges here and there and these challenges have accumulated over time. So, you cannot just wake up and ask the government or the President to solve Nigeria’s problem in a day and this man is just about nine months old in office.