President Bola Tinubu has revealed to Nigerians and investors that there is an ongoing plan to boost the country’s foreign exchange liquidity.
This was as the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun, said that the country was expecting about $10bn inflows in the nearest term, which would help to clear foreign exchange backlog and stabilise the naira.
Speaking at the 29th Nigerian Economic Summit in Abuja on Monday, Tinubu acknowledged the challenges faced by the business community in the financial markets and assured them of additional foreign exchange liquidity to restore market confidence.
He also emphasized his administration’s commitment to strengthening governance by establishing a performance and result-oriented public and civil service culture and structure.
The President outlined the eight priority items of his administration to include ending poverty, achieving food security, economic growth and job creation, access to capital, inclusivity, security, fairness and rule of law, and anti-corruption.
He mentioned several measures introduced by his government to resuscitate the economy, such as the N5bn intervention to support small businesses and the agriculture sector, and also announced upcoming initiatives, including a new student loan programme and consumer credit schemes.
“The need for urgent strategic shifts that impact the ease and cost of doing business within a relatively short period is a matter of existential threat to the survival of enterprises and entrepreneurs.
“The low access to and increasing cost of FX, high cost of inventory, imported inputs, and operations, coupled with the diversity of taxes, continue to erode business balance sheets, with resultant contraction in production and employment, which the conference will have discourse on to address.”
Yusuf added that large firms are battling low-capacity utilisation, while medium, small, and micro-enterprises grapple with multidimensional complexities. These poor economic outcomes have created worsening social conditions that cannot be taken for granted, he added.
