Former Managing Director of National Mirror Newspapers, Dr.
Abiodun Raufu, has predicted that the next few months and years are going to be
difficult for Nigerians.
Raufu noted that the level of unemployment and poverty will
increase due to the global economic recession occasioned by the coronavirus
pandemic that is currently ravaging the world.
Raufu, who currently lectures at Texas Southern University
in the United States of America, noted that in order to reduce the negative
effects of coronavirus, the federal government under President Muhammadu Buhari
must take urgent measures to safeguard the Nigerian economy.
He added that the government must protect the people of the
country from the combined effects of the global Coronavirus pandemic and a
drastic reduction in the price of crude oil upon which Nigerian economy depends
on.
He advised that both the federal and state governments must
initiate measures to ensure that the country’s economy does not collapse.
He advocated for either outright wholesale ban of several
imported luxury items or the imposition of higher import duties on them to
reduce consumption of foreign goods and encourage local production.
Raufu, in a press statement entitled, “Tough times require
tough solutions”, on Sunday,
insisted that Nigeria cannot continue to be the dumping grounds for all manner
of goods from all over the world, especially food items that can be locally
produced.
He said, “The next few months and years are going to be
difficult for Nigerians as the level of unemployment and poverty increases due
to the global economic recession and both the federal and state governments
must initiate measures to ensure that the country’s economy does not collapse.
“The effects of the
Covid-19 pandemic on the global economy will be felt for some time to come.
Saddled with a mono-cultural economy, Nigeria is not making enough money from
crude oil because of global oversupply on the back of an international public
health challenge which has precipitated a devastating global economic
recession.
“The Nigerian economy is currently unsustainable as we
produce little and engage in unrestrained consumption of imported goods. To
make it worse, we have embarked on a borrowing spree, largely targeted at
recurrent expenditure rather than capital projects.”
Raufu advised that what the country needs is a properly
thought-out agricultural policy that will ensure food security, solve youth
unemployment and halt rural-urban migration through the provision of
infrastructures in the rural areas to make the countryside livable.
He canvassed for a drastic reduction in the cost of
governance through a reduction in salary and emoluments of top public officers.
“We have an energetic but largely unemployed youth
population and the time has come for us to create a productive economy that is
anchored on agro-allied industrialization that will create jobs and take people
off the street,” he said.
“The Nigerian brand of democracy has proved extremely
expensive and unsustainable, requiring cost reduction in the operations of
governance and sacrifice by the political leadership at both federal and state
levels for the survival of the country.”
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