Kí ni ètò owó-orí àti ààbò rẹ láti ṣe ìdàgbàsókè Agbada Chad, Sokoto àti Bida?

3. The finances required to bridge Nigeria’s infrastructure gap are in the region of US$100 billion per annum - over the next 30 years. Nigeria does not have the resources to provide all of its infrastructure needs without sacrificing investments in education, health, and other social services. It should be remembered that Nigeria struggles to budget no more than US$30 billion annually. For these reasons, I have been an ardent advocate of private sector presence in Nigeria. I have all along advocated for a private sector friendly business environment so we could leverage its enormous resources, including finance, skills, and technology. I doubt if the Abia state government would have been able to execute this mega project with the resources at its disposal. My policy document outlines how Nigeria could prioritize investments to increase the stock and improve the quality of economic and social infrastructure across the country. We believe that narrowing the enormous gap that exists between the demand and supply of key infrastructure facilities in Nigeria is key to improving the competitiveness of our businesses, opening new economic and entrepreneurial opportunities, and promoting enterprise growth.

Second, President Tinubu’s policies create a hostile environment for businesses, big or small. The private sector is overwhelmed by Tinubu’s dismal policies and overburdened by his failure to address the policy fallouts. The manufacturing sector, which holds the key to higher incomes, jobs, and economic growth, has been bogged down by rising input prices, higher energy and borrowing costs, and exchange rate complexities. For example, since 2023, the average price of diesel has doubled to N1,600 per litre. Electricity tariff has recently been increased by 250% from N68/Kwh to N206/Kwh. As reported by the Guardian (13 May 2024), in Q1 of 2024, energy prices were up by 70%, costing manufacturers N290 billion. Since May 2023, corporate Nigeria has lost more than a dozen enterprises to other countries. Unilever, GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), Procter & Gamble (P&G), Sanofi-Aventi Nigeria, Bolt Food, Equinor, among others had exited Nigeria citing reasons including foreign exchange complexities, security concerns, and high operational costs. According to the Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA), nearly 20,000 jobs may have been lost due to the departure of 15 multinational companies from Nigeria.

Sixth, tackle security headlong. President Tinubu, as a matter of priority, needs to rejig the nation's security architecture as what is currently in place is not serving the needs of the people. The state of pervasive insecurity continues to adversely impact agricultural production and the value it brings to the economy, especially in the Northern parts of the country. Insecurity resulting from terrorism, banditry, kidnapping, and cattle rustling has compelled many crop farmers and pastoralists to abandon their lands and relocate to the neighbouring countries of Niger, Chad, and Cameroun. This has drastically caused a reduction in the production of food and skyrocketed prices of foodstuffs. Food scarcity in Nigeria is so dire that a report by Cadre Harmonize warns that between June and August this year, about 31.5 million Nigerians may face severe food shortages and scarcity I have always been a reform advocate. The Nigerian economy certainly requires a large dose of reform measures to accelerate its transformation after many years of lacklustre growth.

Last night, I played host to political stakeholders from Borno State, led by Hon. Mohammed Kumaila. It is encouraging to see that more people, especially political leaders from across the country, are increasingly becoming concerned about the deteriorating state of the Nigerian nation to the extent of engaging in finding solutions, round the clock. The conversation with the Borno leaders centred more on the current worsening security situation, especially in Northern Nigeria. The consensus is that the occupation of Nigerian territories across some parts of North East, North West, and North Central states is a clear failure of political leadership, especially under the Tinubu-led APC Federal Government. It is unacceptable that bandits or terrorists continue to takeover communities, imposing levies on citizens and disrupting farming activities. I believe that with the right political leadership, Nigerian security forces have the capacity to take on the insecurity confronting the country. It has become urgent for citizens to unite and rescue Nigeria. I thanked the Borno stakeholders for their show of concern about the state of the nation and expressed readiness to support efforts aimed at restoring the peace and economic prosperity of the country. -AA

1.4. ENERGY The ADC will: 1. Diversify Nigeria's energy sources to strengthen national security. We will expand and decentralize energy generation to ensure more reliable, resilient, and locally responsive power systems. ● Empower individual states and groups of states to generate, transmit, and distribute electricity, making power supply more reliable and better aligned with local needs ● Create functional state electricity markets, allowing states to develop energy solutions based on their natural resources and economic priorities 2. Strengthen national fuel security and price stability. Ensure Nigeria is protected from supply disruptions and global price shocks by building buffers that stabilize the domestic energy market. 32

On insecurity, my plan covers every part of Nigeria, the north included. I am committed to setting up Anti-Banditry and Kidnapping Special Units in every state command, made up of highly trained, mobile personnel, to strengthen the response to banditry and kidnapping. I want to adopt a firehose principle for security coordination, driving continuous, high-volume coordination across jurisdictions, so we get faster responses and stronger intelligence sharing. Bordering states will jointly plan operations, share intelligence in real time, and coordinate responses, and this will extend to joint security frameworks with neighbouring countries facing the same threats. I will also push for an independent Internal Affairs Agency to investigate misconduct within police and other security services. This is how we rescue your community from banditry, kidnapping, and cross-border crime. I believe that with the right political leadership, Nigerian security forces have the capacity to take on the insecurity confronting this country.