World Bank Was Wrong: Nigeria is Not A Poor Country. President Jonathan Insist Early this month, the president of the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, had this to say about Nigeria. “The fact is that two-thirds of the world’s extreme poor are concentrated in just five countries: India, China, Nigeria, Bangladesh, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. If you add another five countries, Indonesia, Pakistan, Tanzania, Ethiopia, and Kenya, the total grows to 80 per cent of the extreme poor,” he said. On Thursday, the president gave an interesting translation of Kim’s statement. He faulted the World Bank, saying “the nation is not poor.’’ Addressing workers at the May Day rally held at the Eagle Square, Abuja, the President said “the challenge of the country is not poverty, but redistribution of wealth.’’ He said that the realities on ground did not portray the country as a poor nation, but a nation which abundant wealth needed to be evenly redistributed. “Nigeria is not a poor country. Nigerians are the most travelled people. There is no country you go that you will not see Nigerians. The GDP of Nigeria is over half a trillion dollars and the economy is growing at close to 7 per cent.’ “Aliko Dangote was recently classified among the 25 richest people in the World. “I visited Kenya recently on a state visit and there was a programme for Nigerian and Kenyan business men to interact and the number of private jets that landed in Nairobi that day was a subject of discussion in Kenyan media for over a week. “If you talk about ownership of private jets, Nigeria will be among the first 10 countries, yet they are saying that Nigeria is among the five poorest countries. “Some of you will experience that there is an amount of money you will give to a Nigerian who needs help and will not even regard it and thank you but if you travel to other countries and give such an amount, the person will celebrate. “But the World Bank statistics shows that Nigeria is among the five poorest countries. Our problem is not poverty, our problem is redistribution of wealth.’’ The President added that “probably wealth is concentrated in very few hands and a number of people do not have access to it and that is why my administration is committed in terms of financial inclusiveness and we are working very hard to achieve this.’’ The president’s statement that only a few people are wealthy was a confirmation of that of the World Bank president, who said there is a high concentration of poor people in the country, not that there are no rich people. President Jonathan also read certain political undertones in the process of ratings by international bodies and global rating agencies. He was referring to the recent downgrading of Nigeria’s sovereign rating by Fitch Rating agency. He explained that “so many countries were downgraded economically in the few past months including some African countries. “They looked at Nigeria and we gave explanations and they could not see any convincing reason but to downgrade our economy, they left us as BB minus. “They said elections are coming, politicians are shouting at themselves, it may affect their economy, we will no longer give you stable outlook but give you negative outlook, which is same BB minus. “When so many countries have been downgraded, they said Nigeria is one of the five poorest countries.’’
Posted on: Thu, 01 May 2014 18:41:53 +0000
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