Nigerian economy unstable, directionless under Buhari, says economic society
The Nigerian Economic Society, NES, on Tuesday berated the regime of the President, Muhammadu Buhari, over his handling of the economy, which it said was directionless and unstable. The President of the NES, Prof. Sarah Anyanwu, who stated this when she led members of the society on a visit to the Senate Minority Caucus, lamented that Buhari’s regime excluded economists from its economic management team.
According to her, because of the exclusion of economists from the team, the economy is nose-diving. She noted that members of the NES were in the past included in the economic management team for the required professional advice and guidance on whatever economic policy the Federal Government adopted. She said, “The practice assisted past governments in making sound economic policies required by circumstances or situations on ground.
Apart from being excluded from the National Economic Management Team, NEMT, the NES president lamented that the various ministries, departments and agencies were not patronizing members of the society for required expertise and capacity training of their staff. She, however, urged the National Assembly to expedite actions on considerations and prompt passage of the bill which NES forwarded to both chambers early in the year.
The Senate Minority Leader, Enyinnaya Abaribe, in his response, said he was not surprised by the parlous state of the nation’s economy since those managing it had little or no knowledge on how to make it vibrant.
But the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, in an interview, said, contrary to what the group wanted Nigerians to believe, the Presidential Economic Advisory Council, consists of the best 11 economists in the country. Shehu said the group, probably in its assessment, was mistakenly referring to the former economic management which had since been dissolved and replaced with the Economic Advisory Council, chaired by Prof Doyin Salami.
The presidential spokesman said as far as the economy was concerned, Salami, a 1989 Doctoral Degree graduate in Economics from Queen Mary College, University of London, needed no introduction. He added that another member of the advisory council, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, is not only a former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria but also a former Economic Adviser to the President.
According to Shehu, another member of the team is the Chief Economic Adviser to former President Olusegun Obasanjo while another one is an economist with the International Monetary Fund. Speaking further, The presidential aide said another member of the team, Shehu Yahaya, was the Chairman of the Development Bank of Nigeria, while another member, Bismack Rewane, was a globally respected economist. He added that the team’s secretary was brought in from the Islamic Development Bank.
But backing the NES, a former President of the group, Prof. Akin Iwayemi, noted that in the past, there was an economic management team. He said, the team which included some governors, ministers, the central bank and private sector players, engaged in “robust discussion on economic affairs.
“Then, there was stronger rapport with the economists. If you exclude them, the nation will suffer. We need to have all hands on deck to deal with the challenges we are facing now. We need both the executive and the legislature to understand that economists are partners in progress.