Remarks by VP Osinbajo at the 7th Presidential Quarterly Business Forum in Abuja

Opening Remarks

Before I go into my few remarks, I just want to add to some of the questions that have been asked. A question was asked on the railways and what has been happening especially with respect to being able to evacuate goods from the ports. Two things happening; first, I’m sure some are already familiar with the concession given to General Electric, to refurbish the Narrow Gauge Lines, which starts from the Ports itself. That concession is already in place, and we expect that things should begin to happen very quickly. Also in the private sector, one of the members of that consortium – APM Terminal, is going to do something on a railway station on the way to Ibadan and trying to develop an inland port there. They say they can do this in 10 weeks and we hope that means a further reduction in the pressure on the Apapa port.

Asides from that, the Standard Gauge Line which is funded by the China EximBank has already started and taking off from the Apapa port. We expect that by the end of this year, we should see significant progress between the Lagos-Ibadan end of that Standard Gauge Line. As a matter of fact, our target is to have that bit of it concluded by the end of this year and we hope we can achieve that. So that would move goods from the Apapa port out of Lagos to at least as far as Ibadan, before going to Kano which is the terminal point of the Standard Gauge Line.

The other question I would like to add to is concerning the Eastern ports, because someone asked about the Onitsha port. The concession agreements on that have been finalised, all the technical evaluations have been done, it is going to the Attorney-General’s office and we expect that it should be sorted out very shortly.

In that same Eastern port axis, there is a Warri port, the technical evaluation is still going on, it hasn’t been concluded yet but we expect that it should move on very quickly.

The other point is the frustration that many of us feel when we come into Nigeria through our airports and of course, some of the frustrations around the seaports in bringing in goods.

The point that was made especially about two people sitting together, questioning you and passing your passport from one person to the other, is what we are all generally irritated about. What we require is i-check, which is quite an elaborate device which enables us to get advance passenger information ahead of passengers arriving at the ports. This enables us to do two things; one, it enables us to give visas on arrival because you already have the information of the passenger. Secondly, it removes the necessity of more than one person checking the passport because you already have advance information, the other security person works from the backend. We expect that when that is installed, we would be able to achieve that and remove the nuisance of two/three people checking passports.

Last week, we held a meeting with all the agencies that are usually at the ports, and you find that there are several of them. The idea is to reduce this number and ensure only those who must absolutely be there are there. There are some who don’t need to be there but rather be summoned when their services are required.

The permanent solution we are proposing for bringing in and taking out goods from our ports is through our single window, the National Trading Platform. We have gone very far with that, and we expect that should be on stream very shortly. We are at the point where this is going to FEC for a final approval.

With the single window, a lot of the stress will be greatly reduced, and with the appropriate scanners run by concessions with PPP arrangements, we should be able to achieve greater ease of coming into our ports and exporting goods from our ports.

Main Speech

Let me join my cabinet colleagues in thanking you for making the time yet again to attend the Quarterly Business Forum (QBF). This is the 7th Forum, and there are many here who have attended all seven, to them we are of course, especially indebted for their consistent faith and support for this process; even those who haven’t attended seven, have attended several and there are some who are attending for the first time.

It is important that we continue to emphasize that for us both philosophically and as a practical matter, our partnership with the private sector is fundamental. Aside from the QBF, we have established other platforms to harness the partnership, these include the Industrial Policy & Competitiveness Advisory Council and the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council. These are interactive platforms where we bring the private sector to collaborate, develop and think through policies with us and in the Competiveness Council to even implement policies with us.

I think this is the way we ought and have to continue because when you consider the size of the Federal Government’s budget, and even when you total the aggregate States’ government budget, you find that the absolute amounts are very small indeed but once you factor in the private sector, that becomes the real economy of Nigeria and there is no way of talking about the economic development of Nigeria without the private sector seating at the table, playing a critical role.

I have asked the question, and I ask again? What was wrong with the Nigerian economy and what did we need to do to correct the flaws?

There are several issues, many of which have been well articulated in all earlier presentations. But I want to talk about what I think is probably the biggest problem but which we for some reason hardly talk about when discussing our National economy. This is grand corruption in the public finance space!

Sometimes, the way we talk about the Nigerian economy, it appears like it is the economy of say Norway or Sweden, where all things are equal. Even when we refer to what has taken place in our economy, we almost sound as if this is a normal business environment, a normal public finance environment but that is not the case. I don’t think that any considerations of our economic development can be properly or honestly done without fully analysing the role of grand corruption in the public finance space.

So despite record high levels of oil prices, very little was invested in infrastructure and record levels of leakages were recorded, especially in the past few years. This is the fundamental issue in our economy. Corruption affects everything, it even affects judgement as to what sort of infrastructure to put in place or whether to even put infrastructure in place or whether it would be completed. It is so fundamental that we cannot even think of our economy, without thinking of what to do about it.

Sometimes when we talk about our economy, we say that we have relied on a single commodity, and that is one of the reasons why we are where we are. Yes, that is true but it is the fact that the proceeds of that single commodity were regularly hijacked consistently by a few. That is really the problem. If we spend the proceeds of that single commodity the way we ought to spend it, we won’t be where we are today.

That most of the proceeds go to rent seekers, who invest little in industry and production.

So for example, I’m sure many of us are familiar with the so called strategic alliance contracts with the NNPC and NDPC, the promoters of the companies made away with close to 3billion US dollars, almost a tenth of our reserves at one point! There is no way if someone made away with that amount, a tenth of your reserves, that there won’t be a major economic shock! If we don’t deal with it and talk about it, how do we really discuss our economy in any real honest way with a view to ensuring that these things do not happen again?

In one single transaction, a few weeks to the elections in 2015, the sum of N100billion and $289million in cash were embezzled by a few. When you consider that in 2014, when oil prices were an average of $110 per barrel, only N99billion was spent on Power, Works and Housing, and in one day, N100billion was issued and people essentially shared it and N99billion was spent on Power, Works and Housing. When we talk about our economy, we talk about it like it is normal but it is abnormal by every standard, completely abnormal. Nobody should talk about the economy when you have these huge leakages and corruption; corruption that makes what you allocate to capital and infrastructure nonsense.

From the presentation of Minister of Finance, N14billion was spent on agriculture in 2014, transportation N15billion. The total spend on capital in those critical areas was N153billion and in two weeks to the 2015 election, N150billion was shared and essentially shared! So if your total capital spend is N150billion and you can share N153billion, let’s face it, that is completely incredible! It is the sort of thing that doesn’t happen anywhere else in the world. When we talk about the economy, we absolutely must understand that is the problem

Today with less revenue, we have increased capital funding by 400% in Power, Works and Housing, Defence, Transportation and Agriculture. Economic analysis in Nigeria is either fraudulent or ignorant if we do not bring the money lost to corruption into the maths.

This is what distinguishes this administration from any other. It is the fight against corruption especially in public finance. And I can say that will all sense of responsibility, if you have a President who is not corrupt, at least 50% of your financial problems, especially in public finance, is over. This is what I have seen, and I can prove it with facts and figures.

If the President is corrupt, the entire financial system of the country is compromised, that is what we have seen from the figures. That is an absolute important point that we must take into account.

I am not saying that corruption under this administration has been completely dealt, certainly not. Where corruption has become systematic, you can’t deal with it all in one fell swoop. In any event you still have to deal with corruption fighting back, the system fights back, it is both an internal and external fight, and you have to be steadfast and strategic to win the battle. There is no way you have a system that has consistently thrived on corruption and proceeds of corruption and public finance in particular that will just roll over, no! It is a system that had actively dealt on corruption and the system affects all aspects of governance. So clearly trying to deal with it is not a walk in the park.

I want to say that task has already begun and being done consistently, I believe that going forward in the next few years, no matter how we slice it, if we stick to policies especially in controlling excesses and corruption in public finance, this country will make the kind of progress it deserves to make with all of the resources at our disposal. If we stick to a policy that ensures that as far as public finance is concerned, there is no impunity, and we hold people to account, I am absolutely confident this country has everything it takes to make the sort of progress that we deserve to make as a nation.

Again, let me thank everyone for your participation and continued support and confidence in the work we are doing. I want to say all the comments and issues are taken seriously. We will go back, and look at what we need to do to ensure that all our objectives, plans and thoughts come to fruition, and that our country becomes a better place for doing business and the economy of our country grows to the benefit of our people.

I want to thank you again very much. God bless you.

Released by:

Laolu Akande
SSA, Media and Publicity to the President
Office of the Vice President
March 19, 2018

85th NEC Meeting on February 15, 2018

A. FINAL REPORT ON FORENSIC AUDIT OF REVENUE ACCRUED FROM REVENUE GENERATING AGENCIES

Council received the final report on the Forensic Audit of Revenue Accrued from Revenue Generating Agencies (RGAs) into Federation Account (FA), Excess Crude Account (ECA) and Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF).

The report was prepared by KPMG, and audited 18 Agencies including NNPC, FIRS, Nigeria Customs Services (NCS), NIMASA, NPA, NCC, CBN, DPR, NPDC and many others.

The report covered period January 2010 – June, 2015

Key Issues and Recommendations:

The report observed several cases of under-remittance and a few over remittance in some cases both by identified agencies. There were also late remittances into the various accounts. It therefore recommended that:

NEC should decide on repayment plans for all concerned as well as stepping up oversight function on the relevant agencies to ensure remittance as and at when due.

Recommended the proper and regular auditing of the accounts of the RGAs and those of the FG.

There is also the need for annual review of the agencies.

Council Resolutions:

Council received the report and resolved that the Ad-hoc NEC Committee on the matter be expanded to include a lawyer and an accountant. The Committee would study the KPMG report and the recommendations and report back to Council at its next sitting for possible adoption.

The Federal Government officials including the CBN Governor, the Ministers of Finance, Budget and National Planning and Minister of State, Petroleum Resources would join the expanding Committee to also take a look at the report for FG’s review.

B. UPDATE ON THE SOCIAL INVESTMENT PROGRAMME BY THE SPECIAL ADVISER TO THE PRESIDENT ON THE SOCIAL INVESTMENT PROGRAMME

The Special Adviser to the President on the Social Investment Programme (SIP), briefed the Council on the impact of the National Social Investment Programme (N-SIP). Highlights of the presentation include:

Total Direct Beneficiaries from all the SIP Programme is 7,812,201

Secondary Beneficiaries – 1,500,000, mainly farmers and cooks

Total actual spending in 2016 and 2017 = 15.58% of the budget

The Council was further briefed on the general challenges facing the smooth delivery of the N-SIP. They include:

Corrupt practices in the States – (short-changing, racketeering and harassment of beneficiaries)

Exploitation of the vulnerable (due to poor levels of literacy);

Monitoring and communication (insufficient awareness/publicity) and logistics for monitoring yet to be secured.

Steps to Overcome Obstacles:

N-SIPs is collaborating with various Organisations within and outside the Government to overcome the challenges in the areas of; Monitoring and Security, Sensitization, Communication.

Support/Intervention from State Governments

The N-SIPs requires State Government support as follows:

Micro-Credit scheme under the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP)

States to support in fraud detection and prevention by local officials.

States to support the GEEP loan programme mobilization and facilitate the generation of BVN and the opening of accounts.

Loan recovery from beneficiaries.

Home Grown School Feeding Programme

States to fast-track commencement of programme by signing MoU.

Re-train and re-screen cooks.

Strengthen Monitoring and Evaluation.

National Social Safety Net

States need to demonstrate commitment for the programme to kick off.

Ensure a conducive working environment and commitment to an objective and transparent community-Based Targeting Process.

Support in form of security and fraud detection.

Cash Transfer Programme

States to provide furnished accommodation and logistics as agreed.

Provide security, caution politicians and fast-track Community Based Targeting.

Youth Employment and Empowerment Programme

States to support communication efforts where necessary.

Support monitoring efforts to ensure beneficiaries are resuming and working full time at assigned locations.

Show increasing better commitment to the programme.

C. INTERIM BRIEFING ON NEC’S WORKING GROUP ON HERDSMEN/FARMERS CLASHES

The Vice President reported that the Group has met twice and formed a technical Sub-Committee. The Sub-Committee has been given the assignment of consultations with some of the affected communities.

The Sub-Committee is chaired by Ebonyi State Governor and the NEC Working Group will give a fuller report at the end of the work of the Sub-Committee.

The Vice President also reported that the Working Group has noted the need for joint Military-Police Operation to manage violent outbreak where required while also calling for more efficient intelligence gathering.

The Working Group also calls for the use of the Military force to flush out bandits whose activities have been linked to the clashes, and engagement with traditional leaders to foster peace in their communities.

Working Group also noted that an Agro Rangers Corps should be trained to provide security around ranches, livestock production centres and grazing routes.

The Working Group also noted that the land use laws and regulations invest the States with the power over land titles and use while the Vice President added that the FG will not impose on State Governments. FG will only share templates on best practices for the conduct of livestock production and business.

The Vice President also informed that the President has approved the formation of a Committee to look into the issue of rebuilding affected communities and providing welfare and other facilities as may be considered appropriated.

The President has asked that the Vice President head the Committee.

D. PRESENTATION BY GMD, NNPC ON PMS SUPPLY ACROSS THE COUNTRY AND COST OF UNDER-RECOVERIES BORNE BY NNPC

The Group Managing Director, NNPC, briefed the Council on the PMS supply and cost of under-recoveries arising from difference between importation cost and PPPRA cut off market price.

He told Council that the PMS open market price is continuously shaped by crude oil price volatility in the international market with the attendant cost under-recoveries due to differential between actual supply and distribution.

He informed that favourable market conditions encouraged private participation by Independent Marketers in Nigeria between May – September 2016.

There is currently sudden decline in private participation in Nigeria due to decline in favourable market conditions and also the sudden shock in consumption which over stretches daily supply of petroleum products.

E. REPORT ON EXCESS CRUDE ACCOUNT (ECA)

Council was briefed by the Accountant General of the Federation that the balance in ECA as at 14th February, 2018 stands at $2,317,252,449.57.

F. REPORT ON BALANCE OF THE STABILIZATION FUND ACCOUNT

Council was also briefed by the Accountant General of the Federation that the balance in the Stabilization Fund Account as at 14th February, 2018 stands at N11,290,664,060.06.

G. UPDATE ON NATURAL RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT FUND

Council was equally briefed by the Accountant General of the Federation that the balance in the Natural Resources Development Fund as at 14th February, 2018 stands at N123,624,644,411.24

H. UPDATE ON BUDGET SUPPORT LOAN FACILITY

The Accountant General reported to the Council as follows:

23 States have access to the facility

N16.1 billion has been disbursed as at January 2018.

Laolu Akande
Senior Special Assistant to the President (Media & Publicity)
Office of the Vice President
15th February, 2018

Press Release: FG’S Collaboration With Private Sector Will Facilitate Take Off Of Special Economic Zones, Says Osinbajo in Davos Day Two

The Federal Government and Private Sector will collaborate in creating Special Economic Zones, starting first with the Textile and Garment industry in the hope of spurring the nation’s economic development, according to Vice President Osinbajo, SAN.

Speaking today at an interaction with selected investors in Davos, at the ongoing World Economic Forum, the Vice President noted that “having the right mind-set and understanding where we want to go”, will affect the implementation process whilst ensuring things get done in the nation’s business environment.

He stressed that the collaboration between private sector and the government ensures consistency in the implementation of economic policies.

The Vice President added that one of the reasons he is optimistic about the forthcoming SEZ for garment manufacturing is because it is “specific and is something we can measure very quickly; working with investors and allowing them to tell us what they want to achieve. This will help us attain set objectives.”

Furthermore, Prof Osinbajo stated that having labs, where issues around effective implementation plans would be intensely discussed with expert participants drawn from the private sector and public sector, will also help ensure “that we achieve our objectives” as those labs will set up the implementation agenda and see it through to the end.

Both the Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, and Minister for Industry, Trade & Investment, Dr. Okey Enelamah were also at the interaction.

Speaking earlier, Senator Udoma mentioned that there were many advantages for Nigeria to create the SEZ for Textile manufacturing, citing the use of English as our official language, our political stable environment and the provision of an enabling environment for the private sector.

He further went on to say that confidence is being restored in the hearts of people regarding economic policies.

In his own remarks, the Minister for Industry, Trade and Investment, Okey Enelamah noted that 2018 is a year of implementation regardless of the consequences. Enelamah went on to stress the need for a continuous active implementation of the ERGP based on three legs; investment, trade and industrialisation with an enabling environment as the thrust that runs through all three legs.

Former World Bank Chief Economist, Professor Justin Lin who was also in attendance mentioned that the Garment and Textile industry in Nigeria has huge potential because Nigeria produces cotton, as well as the availability of good locations around the country, including the large markets both domestically and internationally.

Laolu Akande
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media & Publicity
Office of the Vice President
January 24, 2018

Speech: VP Osinbajo’s Remarks at the PEBEC Impact Award Ceremony in Abuja

I want to thank you very much for attending, and also to congratulate all of our awardees who have clearly distinguished themselves and have helped so much in getting to where we are.

I want to say in particular that what this demonstrates very clearly, is that there is absolutely nothing that we cannot achieve as a people if we set our minds to it.

Just listening to what Titi Shonuga had to say a few minutes ago, tells us very clearly that we are a unique people, and we demonstrated that by this extremely rapid movement 24 spaces up and qualifying as one of the 10 most improved economies in the world, within really a space of about a year or so of active work.

What happened with this group of people working together was that first; we had the Executive and Legislative coming together to make this happen. We had the very great leadership of the Senate President and the Right Honourable Speaker, and of course several of the distinguished Members of the House of Representatives who have already been given awards today.

We decided that it was time that we sorted out the business environment and we did something about that. I think the fact that we were able to meet all deadlines, and the Legislature was able to meet all the deadlines that we set, was really incredible.

Working with the States; Lagos, Kano, and seeing that even at the sub-national level, there is so much that could be done even with collaboration with the Federal Government and they can do it so effectively. I think this whole group of people deserve commendation and would like you to give them another round of applause for the excellent things that they did.

We were greatly assisted by the cooperation of all of the MDAs; Immigration, Customs, Airport authority, NAFDAC, CAC, practically every one of the MDAs worked very closely with us and very hard to make this happen. Of course, the PEBEC secretariat led by our own Doctor J as we call her, Doctor Jumoke Oduwole and the great team she has.

I want to say the next plan of action, and I think Dr. Oduwole has already pointed that out, is bound to be a lot harder and we are already beginning to see that unless we put our minds to it again, and work hard and consistently, we might not be able to achieve the objectives we set for ourselves.

I want to say to everyone, that it is so important that we move up as quickly as possible on the Ease of Doing Business scale, but more importantly, that we make a real impact on our business environment because this is not just about moving up or some World Bank rating, for us it is more important that we create an environment where small and big businesses, are able to do business effectively in this environment and do so with ease.

That is the target we have set for ourselves, that the day must come, when anyone who comes to this country can say I was able to do my business easily and effectively, and local business people can confirm that it is just a breeze to do business in Nigeria.

For us, it is more important that we are able to create an environment where small businesses and bid businesses and everyone is able to do business effectively in this environment and to do so with ease. And I think that that is the target we have set for ourselves; that the time must come, a day must come that anyone who comes into this country will say I was able to do business easily and effectively and local businesses can confirm that it’s just a breeze to do business in Nigeria and I think that we can really achieve that. A lot of it has to do with our bureaucracy and the way that the bureaucracy works. We are working very hard on that on the attitude of bureaucrats and persons who have been charged with responsibilities of making things easy. Sometimes, such people mat really not understand their roles as well as they ought because the whole business of processing or giving investment approvals and all of that should be able to make things easy and not be able to become an obstacle of sorts.

And I think that that attitude is changing and we are going to ensure that it continues to make progress as we go along. So just to say, again I thank very much for all of the efforts that have gone into this and to say that the next few weeks and few months will involve a lot of doing and all of us we are going to write into this. And I already have the assurances of our friends and colleagues in the legislature and at the states as well. We are bringing more sub-nationals at this point, may be more states and I’m sure we’re going to be even more successful than we were in the first action plan.

Thank you very much

Laolu Akande
Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media & Publicity
Office of the Vice President
December 12, 2017