By Valentine Amanze
The Vice Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the last general election, Mr. Peter Obi, has said that conscious investment in education, health and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) is the tonic for Nigeria’s speedy economic recovery after the lockdown.
This followed the relaxation of coronavirus (COVID-19) lockdown in many parts of the country.
Obi, who spoke on AIT, pointed out that the measure if adopted, was the pathway to national economic recovery, capable of lifting millions of Nigerians out of poverty.
Obi explained that such were the same steps taken by many countries to move their economies forward.
Citing China and India as examples, Obi said, “Between years 2000 – 2015, China pulled 439 million people out of poverty, while between years 2016 – 2018, India pulled over 170 million people out of poverty”.
He therefore called on the Federal Government of Nigeria to follow the same development models used by China and India to rise above poverty, which included investment in education, health and MSMEs.
Obi, who decried the level of under-funding in the MSME sector, said that at least “$1 billion should be thrown into the sector to boost it”.
He said that the N50 billion set aside by the Federal Government, through the Central Bank of Nigeria, as stimulus package to MSMEs, was not enough.
According to him, there were around 30 million MSMEs in the country, stressing that if they were ‘aggressively’ funded, there would be rapid jobs creation, all round increase in national productivity and a resultant increase in national Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Obi also recommended the funding of MSMEs as a way of curbing the growing income inequality among Nigerians.