Nigeria’s Vice President-elect, Prof. Yomi Osinbajo, today disclosed that the incoming Muhammadu Buhari administration will be inheriting a whopping $60 billion as foreign and domestic debt from the Goodluck Jonathan administration.
Speaking at the opening of a two-day policy dialogue on the implementation of the agenda for change, Osinbajo also said current estimate revealed that about 110 million Nigerians are suffering from poverty.
Speech goes thus:
Remarks by PROF. YEMI OSINBAJO, SAN
VICE PRESIDENT ELECT, FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA, Chairman, Policy DialogueOn the occasion of the 2-Day Policy Dialogue on the Implementation of the Agenda for Change – Wednesday, May 20, 2015
Protocols.
Ladies and gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure to welcome you to this policy dialogue as we enter the final stages of our nation’s transition to a new administration.
In the course of the election campaign, we ran an issues-based campaign that identified certain areas of public policy as high priorities for propelling Nigeria forward. We addressed the challenges of the Economy, Insecurity, Corruption and Jobs Creation. We spoke to the challenge of providing opportunities for self-actualization to millions of our young people who face an uncertain future with understandable anxiety. We also addressed the challenge of providing for the most vulnerable segments of our population by equipping them with the tools to emerge from the crippling limitations of poverty to achieve dignified and productive citizenship.
The figures of extreme poverty in our society- 110 million by current estimates- makes it clear that our biggest national problem is the extreme poverty of the majority. Thus, no analysis is required to conclude that dealing with poverty and its implications is a priority.
We are concerned that our economy is currently in perhaps its worst moment in history. Local and international debt stands at US$60 billion. Our Debt servicing bill for 2015 is N953.6 billion, 21% of our Budget. On account of severely dwindled resources, over two-thirds of the States in Nigeria owe salaries. Federal institutions are not in much better shape. Today, the nation borrows to fund recurrent expenditure.
This is also against the backdrop of a highly unequal society in which, by some reckoning, the largest chunk of the benefits of our national wealth accrues to a small percentage of our population. Our manifesto offered a vision of shared prosperity and socio-economic inclusion for all Nigerians, that leaves no one behind in the pursuit of a prosperous and fulfilling life.
Our goal this morning is to interrogate these positions and propositions before a wider audience and to launch a robust public conversation on policy directions and priorities that will help inform our administration’s approach in the next four years. This forum exemplifies the sort of consultative and consensual approach to policy-making that our party and the new administration intend to model in office.
This morning, on every street corner across this nation, Nigerians, as is their daily custom, will cluster around the local vendor and debate the burning national issues of the day. The fervency of these loosely structure “policy dialogues” suggests that Nigerians are fairly well acquainted with our problems and their touted solutions. The missing link has always been how to implement the identified solutions to these problems. In other words, we know the “what” and the “why” but have not been as adept at the “how.”
Our task is broad and deep. Our sessions will explore a wide range of policy priorities including the diversification of the economy in the wake of declining oil revenues by engendering job-led growth, the revitalization of agriculture in pursuit of job creation and food security, improving the regulatory frameworks in our most strategic sphere of economic activity – the oil and gas sector, improving access to qualitative and affordable healthcare, reducing inequality, reforming our education system to close the gender gap in access to education and to enable our children become effective contestants in the global economy, expand participatory diversity and inclusion in public life and tackle inefficiency and graft in public service.
Our brief is very expansive and must do justice to all the issues on the table. While a definitively exhaustive discourse cannot be conducted within the limits of the time we have. This forum is not intended to produce a comprehensive agenda. Rather, it is designed to inaugurate a robust conversation that will continue long after we have left these precincts. Our immediate duty today is to set the tone for what we desire to be a serious and intelligent dialogue about the future of our nation.
Consequently, this forum cannot and will not be another talk shop. Our deliberations must be informed and pointed submissions that lay adequate emphasis on the “how” of implementation. I enjoin us to avoid over analysis and indeed the paralysis of analysis and focus more on specific actions, resource requirements, time lines, key performance indicators and milestones for evaluating progress, measurable parameters, goals and targets. Our presentations should also profile risks such as the key challenges that will have to be confronted in the process of policy execution.
We have a few days to go- to enter into a new bold Nigerian enterprise. There are many hurdles to scale but we are confident that by God’s grace our Nation will serve its people well.
Thank you.
PROF. YEMI OSINBAJO, SAN
ABUJA-FCT
May 20, 2015
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