President Muhammadu Buhari has said despite the closure of borders to control the smuggling of petroleum products, and to check the inflow of smuggled goods, arms, and ammunition, some unscrupulous persons still tried to undermine every policy of the government, irrespective of the good it was meant to achieve for the country.
The President also charged the government at all levels to go back to the basics, stating that a bottom-up approach is needed from ward to local council, states, and federal.
The President during the 6th regular meeting with the Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC) that was led by Professor Doyin Salami, made these statements in Abuja on Friday.
The President, however, complained about how people still brought in arms and ammunition into the country despite asking security operatives to shoot anyone found illegally with an AK-47.
He said, “They still brought in rice in vehicles and motorcycles. They haven’t stopped, people must show consideration for their own country.
According to Buhari while explaining stated that when the Controller General of Customs called him, saying that 40 tankers filled with patrol had been seized, he simply asks him to sell both the fuel and the trucks and put the money in the treasury.
The President further revealed plans on how the Federal Government intends to develop irrigation facilities to facilitate more people into agriculture adding that agriculture is a good way to subdue the economic hardship rocking the country.
According to the President, he said, “We need to go back to the land because technology is doing away with petroleum and we are lucky that we have other resources, Gas, vast arable land which we not using enough.”
The President further maintains that only 2% of land cultivated is under irrigated while proposing that incentives are needed as an effort for private investors to go into the sector.
In response, the PEAC explained that the Nigerian economy has been out of recession but remains fragile with inflation, high rate of unemployment, and external account weak stating that there is an urgent need to address the challenges of inflation.
The PEAC also recommends an end to all forms of insecurity, mobilization of aids for investment, quick implementation of agricultural reform policies as well as the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) as a basis for breathing life into the industry.
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