THE Labour Party presidential, Peter Obi has said that he is not stingy but frugal, adding that it is a cost-benefit analysis strategy and decision.
Obi disclosed on Sunday, during a conversation with US-based Nigerian professionals – Columbia’s Africa Business Club, Black Law Students Association and Naija We Can –on Afro Economics and Government Policy.
Reacting to Nigeria’s under investment in the education sector, especially with the ongoing Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) strike, which has been on six months said if elected as president in the February 2023 general election, his administration will pursue the global best practices and standards within available resource.
“Certainly, in the medium and long term, 14 percent budgetary funding for education is within the realm of possibility. We will strive to be globally competitive by increasing funding ad ensuring that the (TETFund) resources are re-directed to funding of the Universities and other higher institutions robustly with a view to ending the perennial shrikes by university staff and workers.”
As of August, the federal universities have been on strike for over six months and government’s total spending on education as of 2021 was five percent, a contrast to the global average of 14 percent. Education was one of the areas of success in Anambra state under the Obi administration.
Given the utmost importance of education, nearly 18 million school-aged children in Nigeria are not in school reportedly out of school and the girl child accounts for largest figure.
According to the former Anambra State governor, Nigeria is challenged by high youth unemployment, which stands at 33.3 percent; 54 percent for the youth and 20 million out-of-school-children.
“We must give this country back to the Nigerian youths. Half of our 200 million people are below the age of 30. The median age of this country stands at 17.9, showing that Nigeria has the incredible potentials to develop, if she harnesses the demographic dividends intelligently.
“Harnessing our national youth strength must start with curbing the high youth unemployment and creating funding access to enable our youths become entrepreneurs and drivers of our Small and Medium Scale enterprises(SMEs). We must fund education more robustly, by tweaking the UBEC and TETFund,” Obi said.
Reassuring the US-based Nigerian professionals on the deep fear that the country will not descend into chaos, given the fact overtime, citizens protest has often fell on deaf ears, Obi stated that, while Nigeria’s situation is critical, it is not yet hopeless.
“That might be a cliché, but that is the reality. As I have always said, in the mission to rescue Nigeria, there is no tribe, religion, or class. Indeed, there can be no conscientious objector.”
Speaking on the economy and the most effective path forward for reducing poverty in the country, the LP presidential candidate said, “Economics is driven by the laws of efficiency. We must return to the path of production that results in production and wealth creation, and eventually results in massive employment and poverty alleviation.”
“As a nation, we must look beyond oil. Whatever oil we have will be refined domestically. We will look to solar and other clean energy, especially gas. We have over 84 million hectares of arable land.
“Barely 40 percent of arable land is cultivated today. Nigeria’s arable land is her new oil and gold. We will put our land to work for us; we will grow excess grains and use that for clean energy,” he added.
On the approach to employ to drive the diversification agenda, specifically attracting youths, Obi said, “I am an avid proponent of agriculture, especially as we have so much arable land in Nigeria. In fact, Africa as a whole has 65 percent of arable land. So, there are lots of economic opportunities in agriculture.
“There is an innovative project which the African Development Bank (AfDB) has spearheaded called Special Agricultural Processing Zones. The AfDB is supporting African countries, including Nigeria, to roll out these zones. They are game changers for Nigerian agriculture.”
