The former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Professor Charles Soludo, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to abandon what he termed the “old Buharinomics” if he must bring about the desired change in the country.
Soludo made the call while delivering a lecture at the Realnews Third Annual Lecture in Lagos yesterday, which he titled, “Avoiding the Mistakes of the Last Buharinomics.”
Soludo, an expert in macroeconomics, said there seems to be nostalgia in Buhari on what is required in a competitive market economy.
He said unlike during his first coming to power in the 80s where the exchange rate, interest rate, petrol price and several other prices were largely fixed, the president and the presidency need to learn fast on the realities of the economy.
He said, “Evidence from our history shows that the current policy regime is inconsistent with the objective of creating jobs, growing income and reducing poverty. If we stretch the argument to the limit, we can literally ban everything.
“Why do we allow foreign exchange to be allocated to school fees abroad when we have over 100 universities in Nigeria? Why do we allow forex for medicals abroad when we have hospitals, or allowing people to pay for mortgages for their homes abroad? These things also cost billions in foreign exchange. We should ban all of them.”
Soludo argued that the economy has been under performing in the last few months.
“We are creating portfolios of instant billionaires while the small and medium enterprises are dying,” he added.
He said the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) must frame its intervention in the economy with a target to double the Growth Domestic Product (GDP) from $550 billion to $1.1 trillion in the next 12 years and reduce poverty by half in the effort to put the country on the road to becoming one of the seven largest economies by the end of the century.
Speaking on fuel subsidy, he stated that the fundamental case against subsidy removal is not economic, but the fact that the citizens do not trust the government to optimize on the use of resources derivable from it.
On the refinery and the resuscitation of a national carrier, he noted that we should have reached a stage in our history where we draw a slogan that government in business is a bad business
On the Treasury Single Account (TSA), Soludo said, “For an economy in urgent need of refuelling, it is not very sound economics to pile up idle cash and concentrate them at the CBN”.
The former CBN governor also took a swipe at the exchange rate regime of the CBN, noting that the debate on the exchange is reminiscence of the kind of debate in the 1970s, “lacking in evidence and factual analysis.”
Soludo made the call while delivering a lecture at the Realnews Third Annual Lecture in Lagos yesterday, which he titled, “Avoiding the Mistakes of the Last Buharinomics.”
Soludo, an expert in macroeconomics, said there seems to be nostalgia in Buhari on what is required in a competitive market economy.
He said unlike during his first coming to power in the 80s where the exchange rate, interest rate, petrol price and several other prices were largely fixed, the president and the presidency need to learn fast on the realities of the economy.
He said, “Evidence from our history shows that the current policy regime is inconsistent with the objective of creating jobs, growing income and reducing poverty. If we stretch the argument to the limit, we can literally ban everything.
“Why do we allow foreign exchange to be allocated to school fees abroad when we have over 100 universities in Nigeria? Why do we allow forex for medicals abroad when we have hospitals, or allowing people to pay for mortgages for their homes abroad? These things also cost billions in foreign exchange. We should ban all of them.”
Soludo argued that the economy has been under performing in the last few months.
“We are creating portfolios of instant billionaires while the small and medium enterprises are dying,” he added.
He said the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) must frame its intervention in the economy with a target to double the Growth Domestic Product (GDP) from $550 billion to $1.1 trillion in the next 12 years and reduce poverty by half in the effort to put the country on the road to becoming one of the seven largest economies by the end of the century.
Speaking on fuel subsidy, he stated that the fundamental case against subsidy removal is not economic, but the fact that the citizens do not trust the government to optimize on the use of resources derivable from it.
On the refinery and the resuscitation of a national carrier, he noted that we should have reached a stage in our history where we draw a slogan that government in business is a bad business
On the Treasury Single Account (TSA), Soludo said, “For an economy in urgent need of refuelling, it is not very sound economics to pile up idle cash and concentrate them at the CBN”.
The former CBN governor also took a swipe at the exchange rate regime of the CBN, noting that the debate on the exchange is reminiscence of the kind of debate in the 1970s, “lacking in evidence and factual analysis.”
