Chairman, Senate Committee on Privatisation, Senator Ben Murray-Bruce, has blamed his colleagues in the red Chambers for preferring foreign cars to locally made cars even as Reps concurred and patronized Nigerian cars in keeping with the ‘Buy Nigeria’ campaign of the government.
The Bayelsa lawmaker made the remarks during an oversight visit to Peugeot Automobile of Nigeria (PAN), in Kaduna and expressed dissatisfaction on the continuous demand for foreign made vehicles by the same government officeholders driving the Buy Nigeria crusade.
According to him, “The House of Representatives brought made in Nigeria cars, the Senate did not. And I think that’s wrong. The biggest problem we have in Nigeria is that people who lead us are not patriotic Nigerians. You can’t talk about unemployment if you go around driving cars that are not made in Nigeria, whereby you put Nigerians out of work.
“Maybe we will make a law that when we catch any government official driving a non-made in Nigeria car, we will make sure we let people who voted him/her to understand that he is not a patriotic Nigerian.”
Senator Murray-Bruce, however assured PAN of the committee’s commitment to assist in doing everything humanly possible in reviving the automobile sector.
In his welcome address, the Managing Director of PAN, Ibrahim Boyi, identified smuggling and inconsistent government policies as major challenges facing the automobile sector.
He said “Full implementation of importation policy and enforcement is key to reviving the automobile sector,” noting that “The Auto industry is a very important segment for every country’s economy because of its huge potential for creating jobs”.
