Reconstitute economic team, review fiscal policies for early exist of recession—NACCIMA
The leadership of the Organised Private Sector (OPS) under the command of the Nigerian Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA) has called early reconstitution of the nation’s economic team, if any to begin immediate review of all fiscal policies that failed in 2016.
In their main position, OPS maintained that 2016 fiscal policies were marred by unworkable ideas which they argued, plunged the largest economy in Africa into avoidable recession.
The lead position of the group was presented at a news briefing by the National President of NACCIMA, Dr. Bassey Edem, when he was reviewing the state of the economy and the association’s perspective on some trending socio-economic issues in the country.
Edem said “It is now time for the Federal Government to reconstitute the economic team. The economic team is made up of only the public sector, but the Nigerian economy is not for the government alone, but for Nigeria as a whole”.
“The private sector must be carried along in policy formulation. Engaging the private sector is different from being involved in the policy formulation process. More members of the private sector must be injected in the economic team so whenever economic policies will be set, they will tell the economic team where it pinches them. We believe if this is done, it will help us not to repeat the errors of 2016.”
NACCIMA revealed that the past six months has remained bleak, but however stated that there are a few encouraging signs with the foreign reserves increasing steadily since mid-October according to the 30-day moving average report of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) shows that it is possible for early recovery.
Edem argued further that year-on-year inflation stands at 18.48 per cent while global price of crude oil increased marginally with the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) daily basket price currently at $51.99.
Looking at the macro-economic indicators, he said the flexible exchange rate policy introduced by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has provided mixed results whereas the official market rate of the naira to the U.S dollar stands at N305 while the parallel market rate hovers between N450 and N482.
While calling for early injection of strategic control measures for inflationary trends, NACCIMA boss restated that a single digit interest rate is critical to stimulating the real sector of the economy and enhancing access to finance to increase economic activity in the country.
According to him, “We acknowledge the work of Federal Government in ensuring that special intervention funds are available to business operators at single-digit rates”.
However, sources say the President is currently working on a possible dissolution of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) before the end of January to allow for the injection of more technocrats into the Council.
