Abuja – An Economist, Dr Aminu Usman, has advised the
Federal Government to begin the implementation of the 2016 budget to
curb inflation in the country.
Usman, a lecturer in the Department of Economics, Kaduna State
University, gave the advice in an interview with the News Agency of
Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Friday.
“We have one of the largest budgets in terms of nominal value so it
is expected to be an expansionary budget to boost activities in the
economy.
“So, one of the things that will robust this is for the government to
start implementing the budget in earnest.
“The government must work as if they are in a hurry, when they start
implementing the budget in earnest, then activities will pick up, and
then prices will come down.
“We are lucky, we are approaching the rainy season; few months now
into the rainy season and implementation of the budget, we will
actually see prices coming down gradually.
Usman expressed relief over Friday’s signing of the 2016 budget by
President Muhammadu Buhari.
He also said that the fail in the oil price also contributed to
inflation.
“Once you see the revenue from oil drops, it will have negative
impact on prices of items in the country because the ability of the
CBN to protect the Naira becomes weak,” he said.
The don said government should, as a matter of urgency, “put in place
an Economic Management Team that is not partisan but highly
professional and a breed without greed”.
“Under what policy are we guiding the economy? There is no defined
economy policy for this government.
“Everybody will end up doing its own thing- CBN is here, Ministry of
Finance is there, National Planning is there and Trade and Investment
is there.
“There has to be coordination and that is because we don’t have a
standard Economic Management Team that will coordinate activities, and
give a guide to economic policy in this country.”
In addition, Usman said the team, when put in place, should ensure the
restoration of export promotion incentives that were withdrawn, due to
corruption and other vices.
“The team should cause certain tariffs and bans to be imposed on
certain category of items in order to protect the local industries,” Usman said.
(NAN)
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