A new approach is needed to change the trajectory of our country and the dire state of unemployment. SURE-P, a federal government agency estimates that over 40 million Nigerian youths are unemployed. I put that figure at 60 million as about 80% of our population of 170 million people are between ages 1-35yrs. Conditions must be set in place to create up to 45 Million jobs in 4 years. This is a task to which I shall be dedicating myself every working day. As things stand right now, there are no macro-economic actions that can be taken by this present administration to create jobs as jobs are not created in a vacuum. A holistic approach is what is needed as follows: · Short term plan for immediate and total availability of electricity in rural and urban areas. · Massive injection of government funds into the banking system to help reduce interest rate to single digit. The biggest component of job creation is access to capital. · Tariff tweaking to encourage import substitution and simultaneously creating incentives for local manufacturing and subsidizing export oriented companies. · Creation of youth friendly agricultural communities to boost production of economic trees (read article on Chief Giwa Bisirodipe, The News, June 14, 2014), Cocoa, Rice, Palm Oil, Cassava and Wheat around the country to satisfy local consumption and for exportation. · Sustainable approach to massive road construction to open up the rural areas and ease transportation of goods and services across the country. This will be achieved through a tax on all petroleum products and toll gates on major highways. · Massive investment in solid minerals development by creating a Solid Minerals Development Corporation (SMDC) which, just like the NNPC will go into partnership with the private sector for massive exploitation of minerals. · Opening up the railways to private development to facilitate movement of heavy goods and help redefine how people live and work. My administration will complete a high speed rail project that runs from Lagos to Sokoto and Lagos to Calabar in 48 months and eventually form a ring road around the country.
Posted on: Sat, 27 Dec 2014 17:37:40 +0000
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