I Will Fight Every Obstacle to Nigerian Business Competitiveness—Tinubu
President Bola Tinubu has guaranteed Nigerians that he will do everything in his power to make Nigeria a centre for booming investments and a globally competitive economy.
“I will combat every impediment to economic competitiveness in Nigeria, and I will not hesitate to remove any clog impeding our path to making Nigeria a destination of choice for local and foreign investments,” President Muhammadu Buhari said in his New Year’s message to Nigerians on Monday.
Nigeria’s economy has been battling with an overvalued currency, which has resulted in continuously high inflation as well as a high rate of unemployment and poverty that has not abated despite many economic interventions.
Despite these economic downturns, President Tinubu stated that his tough economic reforms were required to take Nigeria in the correct direction.
Read also: Tinubu Tells Nigerians: “Our Spirit Must Remain Undaunted Because Tough Times Never Last”
“Over the course of our administration’s first seven months, I have made some difficult but necessary decisions to save our country from budgetary disaster.”
“One of those decisions was the elimination of gasoline subsidies, which had become an unsustainable financial burden on our country for almost four decades.” Another was the removal of a few people’s stranglehold on our foreign exchange system, which benefited primarily the wealthy and powerful among us. “These two judgements, without a doubt, caused considerable discomfort to individuals, families, and businesses,” the president stated.
He also noted that his administration had worked hard to improve service delivery by providing reliable power generation and distribution.
Muhammadu Buhari, who was president at the time, agreed to increase the nation’s grid operational capacity from less than 5,000 MW to 7,000 MW by 2021, 11,000 MW by 2023, and 25,000 MW by 2025.
However, the consequences of COVID-19 slowed progress.
“After laying the framework for our economic recovery plans in the final seven months of 2023, we are now ready to boost the speed of our service delivery across sectors.”
“Just this past December, during COP28 in Dubai, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and I agreed and committed to a new deal to accelerate the delivery of the Siemens Energy power project, which will eventually deliver a reliable supply of electricity to our homes and businesses under the Presidential Power Initiative, which began in 2018.”
“Other power installation projects are proceeding across the country to increase the resilience of our transmission lines and optimise the integrity of our national grid,” he added.
Concerning food security and supply, President Tinubu stated that agricultural programmes had been launched to preserve staple crop growth throughout thousands of arable acres around the country.
“We will accelerate our plan to cultivate 500,000 hectares of farmlands around the country to grow maize, rice, wheat, millet, and other staple crops to assure consistent food supply, security, and affordability.”
Under our National Wheat Development Programme, we began dry season cultivation on 120,000 hectares of land in Jigawa State last November.”
The President also guaranteed Nigerians that refining operations at the Dangote and Port Harcourt refineries will begin this year.
“In 2024, we will take another step towards resuming local refining of petroleum products with the Port Harcourt Refinery and the Dangote Refinery, which will be fully operational.”
President Tiunub, on the other hand, sought Nigerians’ support and urged people not to lose hope, stating that he was determined to fulfilling his campaign pledges.
“Dear Compatriots, take it from me: the going may be harsh and tough, but our spirit must stay unbowed since hard times never last.” We are built for this time—never to flinch, never to waver.”