Nigeria Would Have Been Prosperous If Our Resources Were Properly Managed – Buhari
- Current situation due to mismanagement.
- Buhari lauds Ecobank for supporting his administration’s diversification agenda.
President Muhammadu Buhari has said the current level of poverty and insecurity being experienced across the country is due to decades of neglect and resource mismanagement by past administrations.
Buhari who stated this on Tuesday when he received the board of Ecobank Transnational Incorporated, led by the Group Chairman, Mr Emmanuel Ikazoboh at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on Tuesday maintained that if assets and resources available to Nigeria were properly managed, the country would be prosperous and peaceful.
“But the poverty and insecurity we are experiencing today are results of decades of neglect and resource mismanagement,’’ he said.
He, however, stated that the federal government is committed to the goals of securing the country, including economic growth, and fighting corruption.
Buhari pointed that Nigeria is in a unique position as the most populous and resource-rich nation on the African continent, adding that the resources would be harnessed and properly managed, to engender a prosperous and peaceful country.
He further stated that his administration is not not only determined to reverse the trend of squander-mania and mismanagement, adding that progress has been made in some areas such as agriculture.
While appealing to Ecobank to “institute a special fund to develop agriculture, which will cement your legacy as a bank that helped to transform this region’s economic fortunes, the President commended the bank for being active in promoting financial inclusion which he said is key to his administration’s diversification agenda’.
Speaking on a request made by the bank for decongestion of Apapa ports, and rebuilding of the transnational Lagos-Badagry-Seme road, the president said work is being done in all those areas.
“By the grace of God, you will start seeing results during my second term in office,” he asserted.
Speaking, Ikazoboh, who explained that the Ecobank Group was in 36 countries in Africa and 40 globally said the bank, founded 30 years ago by private sector entrepreneurs, has over 20 million customers, with over eight million of them in Nigeria.
According to Ikazoboh, the President’s recent re-election was a testimony of the hard work done.
He added that reforms embarked on by the administration, across sectors, “will have deep, long term impact on Nigeria, West Africa, and Africa.’’
