Nigeria has been said to be servicing consumption rather than production considering the 2024 budget put forward by President Bola Tinubu.
This was stated by the Chief spokesperson of the Labour Party Presidential Campaign Council (LP-PCC) and former National Chairman of the National Conscience Party (NCP), Dr Yunusa Tanko in an interview.
According to Tanko, it is regrettable that a nation as big as Nigeria with its vast potential is focused on consuming and not producing anything, saying “our budget as it is now is a consumable budget, not a producing budget.”
“It is regrettable that we are servicing consumption and not production. Assuming we have been servicing productions, we would have been able to have appreciable income. But that hasn’t been the case. The 2024 budget is about N27 trillion, but about N18 trillion of it is going to be sourced from the Internal Generating Revenue (IGR).
“The question we need to ask ourselves is: how will this huge IGR be generated? Won’t it be by taxing the people who are not producing anything? If you go to the seaport, you will find out that we are consuming so many things, but nothing is being taken out of the country as products. So it is going to be in-house taxation, which implies that more burdens will be put on the people. In other words, it will mean paying more pain and tears.
“Looking at it closely, we have a deficit budget of over N9trillion to service. The question is: how do you service such a huge amount when you are not producing anything? You have a recurrent budget of about N9trillion with about N8trillion for capital expenditure and then you have a servicing loan of about N8trillion.
“This implies that even the debt you have incurred to service the budget is more than how you are going to service the budget. So you can see that the budget itself is skewed against the interest of the people. So, Tinubu’s government ought to have invested in production, so that you will able to get something.
“For instance, if you take a loan of N100 million, you should be thinking of producing something with a value of about N125 million. So even if you are serving the loan with N10 million, at least you will have N15 million as you gain. That is how to use funds, not in the other way. So our budget as it is now is a consumable budget, not a producing budget.”
The LP spokesperson said that based on the budget put forward, terrible and challenging times await Nigerians as the prices of food and other items will continually increase.
“I see more terrible times for the country. God forbid. This is because as we speak now, the price of fuel is heading gradually towards N700 per litre, which will no doubt bring more pain for the people. Upon all, we are not producing. I keep hammering on production because it is only when you are producing and selling that the naira will be appreciating against the dollar. But when you are only consuming, the dollar will keep appreciating against the naira.
“At present, the rate is still over N1000 per dollar at the unofficial rate. And going into the festive season, it is bound to even be higher. So the people should braze up for more challenging times, and the government needs to change its policy direction to alleviate the sufferings of the people. Let it start thinking majorly of production and making of consuming things that we use in Nigeria so that our importation can reduce. More so, there are still appreciable resources that can be utilised in the agricultural sector, considering the food inflation crisis we have been battling in recent times.
“Once the production takes effect, the government may also consider a semi-shutting down of the border, which implies that if you are bringing in about 100 bags of rice into the country, you partly shut down the border by allowing only 50 bags to come in, while your farmers produce the other 50 bags locally. Gradually, you can increase the production part to 75 bags and allow only 25 bags to come in. By so doing, a day will come when your production capacity will deliver all the 100 bags needed by the people and you will not need to import anything. That is how it is done in some of the big economies we know today.
“The bigger implication is that even your naira will appreciate more against the dollar. But when you don’t think like that and simply just consume and underutilise the people, you will keep having a deficit upon deficit budget, which will bring more hardship to the people,” he said.
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