By Favour Nnabugwu

The federal government has set a target of $33, 000 per capita income by year 2050, from the current level of $3, 500.

The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, made this known at the opening of the on-going Nigerian Economic Summit today

Ahmed said, “I am pleased to inform you that the draft Nigeria Agenda 2050 is being finalised and will be launched soon.

“The Plan seeks to increase the country’s per capita income to $33,000 by 2050 and place Nigeria amongst the rank of Upper Middle Income Countries.

“The Plan will be implemented by successive governments through Six, 5-Year Medium-Term National Development Plans and Annual Budgets.

“The Nigeria Agenda 2050 has a moral imperative to lower the poverty and unemployment rate significantly as this is the only way we can ensure sustainable broad-based growth”

According to Mrs. Ahmed, the government would renew the social contract with Nigerians and encourage the citizens to pay their taxes to enable government fund Programmes and projects.

She said that the federal government would consciously design Programmes and projects that would attract Diaspora Nigerians to invest at home.

Mrs. Ahmed added that the administration was focused on unlocking the economic potential of the non-oil and high employment generating sectors to achieve sustainable and inclusive growth and development.

Earlier in his address, the Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Prince Clem Agba, said that the administration was review 18 laws and 10 policies considered as o stacked to the private sector businesses.

The minister said that the National Development Plan 2017-2025 paid particular attention to the diversification of the economy, amongst others.

His words, “The NDP 2021 – 2025 has a unique objective of establishing a strong foundation for a concentric economic diversification, implying that the economy had already been diversified but the focus of the Plan is to deepen the diversification effort within the sectors such that each sector could substantially increase its contribution to GDP and create more jobs.

“The Volume III deals with the legislative imperatives identified as binding constraints to Plan implementation and has identified 18 laws and 10 policies that constrained Plan implementation over the years.

” A Technical Working Team (TWT) comprising the Office of the President on Ease of Doing Business, relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) and a renowned legal firm has been set-up to review these laws and policies with a view to enriching Plan implementation.”

In his Keynote address, one of the founding fathers of the NESG, Mr. Paschal Dozie, said that “the Nigeria we need” must be “truly federal”, not just in name but in reality.

He said that there the Exclusive and the Concurrent Lists should be reviewed to enable decentralization of government, with a real federal system, as obtained in other federal governments.

He added that the federal government should de-personalise institutions to make Nigeria more attractive to domestic and international investors.

In his contribution as a panelist, economist and banker, Mr. Atedo Peterside, noted that the nation was being held hostage by what he described as “rigged-properity” by a few elite.

According to him those in that class were less than 1 million people but they have improverished the multitudes of ordinary Nigerians.

Mr. Peterside regretted that based on data released by the National Bureau of statistics (NBS), at the end of 2015, 68 million Nigerians were in full employment but that as at end of 2020 the figure of Nigerians in full employment has fallen to a mere 31 million.

He lamented that very few Nigerians had access to the exchange rate at the official rate and those with such access did not represent the generality of Nigerians.

Mr. Peterside also condemned the fuel subsidy which has continued to put pressure on the nation’s fiscal position.

According to him, those who were involved in the massive oil theft were those in government or their cronies.

He wondered how many Nigerians had.the capacity to bring in ships into the country and load crude oil and take it away from the country, without the government stopping them.

By Favour Nnabugwu

Not less than 70 per cent of Nigerian children are suffering from learning poverty, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)

The World Bank defined learning poverty as the inability of a 10-year-old to read or understand a simple sentence or solve basic numeracy problem.

According to UNICEF, “Research has shown that schooling does not always result in learning. Many children, even if in school, are not learning fundamental skills required for proficiency. As a result, many children are experiencing learning poverty, with an estimated 70 per cent of Nigerian children falling under this category, varying from state to state”

“Even before COVID-19, the world was grappling with a learning crisis with half of all ten-year-olds in middle and low-income countries unable to read or comprehend a simple story. In sub-Saharan Africa this is nearly 9 in every 10 children.”

Hence, the import of the ongoing launch of the Nigeria Learning Passport in states across the country.

Usamatu Mohammad Gona, the Katsina State Coordinator of the programme during the launch in Katsina said, “the Nigeria Learning Passport is an electronic distance learning medium fortified with audio-visual materials and books to aid self-based learning has been launched in Katsina State to help fast track learning among pupils and students of primary and junior secondary schools across the state.

“The platform makes learning possible even outside the confines of a school which will help address the spiralling number of out-of-school children, especially in states where insecurity hinders access to schools.”

Gona explained that “the NLP education model offers foundational literacy and numeracy skills, sciences, digital and employability skills. The Learning Passport supports early childhood education, primary and secondary education, and provides adolescent skills, technical & vocational education that is tailored to the needs of children and youth who are either out of school, or in need of support to ensure the education they are receiving is of sufficient quality.”

According to Gona, the NLP has the potential to provide access to learning to every Nigerian child within or outside the four walls of a classroom.

Gona who noted that the NLP platform is geared towards ensuring that no Nigerian child misses out of education said “education isn’t just a fundamental right but the fulcrum around which the engine of development revolves; it is the engine of the progress of any society.

“We plan to reach every Nigerian child over time with the NLP but in the short-term, out target is to reach 4.5 million learners by 2023 and 12 million by 2025.

“Additionally, 30,500 teachers and school leaders are being trained on the use of the NLP and on how to integrate technology in classroom instructional practice.

Narrowing it down to Katsina, the NLP Coordinator in the state said: “In Katsina, we are targeting 10,000 learners and teachers across the over 300 schools in the state before the end of November 2023.”

The Learning Passport is delivered by UNICEF and the Federal Ministry of Education and powered by Microsoft, with funding support from Global Partnership for Education (GPE) and is free of charge for all learners.

By Favour Nnabugwu

Leaders of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) have lifted economic and financial sanctions imposed on Mali, after its military rulers proposed a 24-month transition to democracy and published a new electoral law.

The bloc imposed stiff sanctions on Mali in January after the junta said it would not organise democratic elections the following month as initially planned.

ECOWAS Commission President Jean Claude Kassi Brou told a news conference that the sanctions will be lifted immediately. Borders with Mali will reopen and regional diplomats will return to Bamako. read more
However, the heads of state decided to maintain individual sanctions, and the suspension of Mali from ECOWAS, until the return to constitutional rule,” Kassi Brou said.

The individual sanctions targeted members of the ruling junta and the transitional council.

Mali has defaulted on over $300 million of its debt due to the sanctions, which cut it off from the regional financial market and the regional central bank.

The West African leaders meeting in Accra also accepted a pledge from the junta that seized power in Burkina Faso in January to restore constitutional order in 24 months.
Kassi Brou said that after a lengthy discussion with the coup leaders in Burkina Faso, a new proposal for a 24-month transition was more acceptable, after the heads of state rejected a proposed 36-month transition.

Economic and financial sanctions on Burkina Faso were also lifted, he said.

But the ECOWAS leaders rejected a three-year transition proposed by coup leaders who seized power in Guinea in September. They told Guinea’s junta to propose a new timeline by the end of July or face economic sanctions.

The heads of state appointed Benin’s former president Yayi Boni as a new mediator and urged the Guinea junta to work with him and quickly propose a new timetable.

“Beyond that, economic sanctions will be imposed,” Kassi Brou said.