*Party develops economic blueprint
by Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja
The Action Democratic Party (ADP) has blamed the growing unemployment, poverty and insecurity in the country on corruption and poor policy formulation.
The party said the present administration has failed to meet the aspirations of the Nigerian masses especially in the area of human capital development and job creation.
ADP said it has good plans to turn the situation around when voted into power.
Addressing a press conference at its national headquarters in Abuja, ADP National Chairman, Mr. Yabagi Yusuf Sani, said after a thorough research, the party has developed an economic blueprint anchored on free trade and private sector participation as the core driver of the economy.
Speaking on the poor state of things in Nigeria presently, Sani said corruption and poor policy responses to the yearnings of the masses have led to the deplorable living condition of Nigerians and insecurity in the country.
He said: “Nigeria appears not to be winning the war. First, there is the politicization of the fight. However, the most insidious producer of corruption is the system and structure that we operate which motivates and inspires corruption.
“While it is good chasing after those who have pilfered from the common till, it is far more profitable and time saving to truncate the system that breeds corruption. ADP has developed the strategy of total reforms of the bureaucracies to address this challenge.”
On the state of the economy, the party also blamed the recession on the steps taken by the government.
“Nigeria just wriggled out of recession caused by the disingenuous steps taken by the government and the impacts were immediate and sharp. The unemployment rate has doubled from 9.9% in the third quarter of 2015 to 18.8% in the third quarter of 2017 according to the NBS. The statistics agency has also disclosed that the number of unemployed Nigerians also increased to 15.99 million in the third quarter of 2017 from 11.9 million in the third quarter of 2016.
“It is disheartening today that Nigeria has been mindlessly turned into a mono- economy so dependent on crude oil to the neglect of other sectors of the economy. Crude oil now constitutes about 90 % of Nigeria’s foreign exchange earnings and about 80% of its total export. The most pathetic aspect is that successive leaders in Nigeria have failed to add value to the crude oil. It is shameful that over 90% of Nigeria’s crude is exported abroad for refining at great cost to this country and the leaders don’t feel a tinge of conscience.
“But we know why this ill-motivated and dubious policy has sustained for years. The cabal that runs this crude oil export business has appropriated the sector with explicable but highly corrupt initiatives predicated on a subsidy regime that has corrosive impact on the Nigerian oil and gas industry. That is
why the cabal in connivance with their cronies and collaborators in government make the nation appear helpless as its four refineries are deliberately plunged into protracted disrepair.”
According to Sani, Nigeria is said to consume about 30 million litres of petrol, while the nation’s refineries can only cumulatively produce 450,000 litres per day because our leaders have deliberately refused to find solutions to this anomaly.
On the economic blueprint being packaged by ADP, Sani said the party will implement a new policy on trade and investment that will entail opening up opportunities for local and foreign investors whether they are small or medium enterprises or multi -national companies.
“When we come to power, we shall change the structure of the economy from its purposeless colonial foundation to a more productive economy. Anyone for instance who wants to do business in the oil sector in Nigeria must refine petroleum products in Nigeria. We intend to establish factories with diverse capacities in every senatorial district in the country and fashion out the development initiatives suitable for the 774 local government areas in Nigeria where we will source guaranteed loans not to pay salaries of bloated bureaucracies but to invest in processing agricultural products and add value to them by creating cottage industries. This is where the water resources of the country become even more useful,” he said.
