Africa Press-Nigeria:
The deposed Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, on Tuesday, decried the effect of government’s wrong economic policies on Nigerians.
He said wrong economic policies had negatively impacted on the livelihood of Nigerians and turned many multi-millionaires to paupers overnight.
Sanusi, who stated this while delivering a keynote address at the 5th Kaduna Investments Summit, urged governments at all levels to consider the impact of their economic decisions on Nigerians.
He said: “One of the things the government needs to do is to understand the impact of wrong economic decisions or address economic occurrences on human beings and individuals. It affects us in direct and personal ways. Most people are not looking at human beings. We should not just walk away when inflation rises.
“For those of us who have grown up – in my generation, those who grew up in the oil period – we suffered I think about three occasions now with this boom and bust. We have seen highs and lows, friends who are multimillionaire became paupers.
“We have seen people who send their children to school only to bring them back. Even this year, people are bringing their children back. If your child is in the United Kingdom and you need to buy pounds at over N600, you move him to Cyprus, Benin, and so on.
“Think of the millions of people who can no longer afford to eat. Then, two percent becomes a massive number. GDP has declined by one percent! In an exam, (if) you move from 67 percent to 66 per cent (it) is no deal. But if your GDP falls by one percent, for example, $250 billion – GDP, then we are talking of $2.5 billion. You think of $2.5 billion in terms of people that are earning N20,000 or N30,000 per month. How many millions of Nigerians are wiped out or family won’t be able to afford to eat?
“What makes Nigeria successful in the pre-oil period? it was diversification. Dynamism in the trading sector and diversity in the export base, rubber, cocoa, palm oil, and so on.”
