…It’s time to put food on the table at affordable price -Elumelu
President Bola Tinubu on Thursday inaugurated the Presidential Economic Coordination Council (PECC) tasked with strategising a way out of Nigeria’s current economic situation.
The Council has a mix of government officials, top private sector players, and consultants including President of the Dangote Industries Limited, Mr Aliko Dangote; Chairman of the United Bank of Africa, Mr Tony Elumelu, and Chief Executive Officer of Financial Derivatives Company Limited, Bismarck Rewane.
Briefing State House correspondents after the inauguration, the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Mr. Wale Edun, said, “The President has just inaugurated the Presidential Economic Coordination Council and that is a body that is made up of the President’s Economic Management Team, the Legislature, represented by the leaders of the National Assembly, the Senate President and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, as well as, very importantly, the sub-nationals, represented by the chairman of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum, and, of course, the elite of the private sector.”
Edun said the Council members were presented with the outcomes of Mr. President’s review of the accelerated stabilization and advancement plan, “and that was an emergency plan to cover the next six months, which Mr. President had directed that a combination of his own Economic Management Team and the sub-nationals, the governor’s level, and the private sector put together for his consideration”.
“The song of that very important exercise is that a N2 trillion package involving N350 billion funding for Health and Social Welfare; N500 billion funding for Agriculture and Food Security; N500 billion for the Energy and Power sector and general business support of about N650 billion,” Edun said.
“In addition to a range of policy measures and tax measures, there is a range of executive orders which Mr. President has signed and which are being gazetted to ease the cost of doing business at this particular time,” he said.
Also speaking, the Chairman of Heir Holding and Founder of Elumelu Foundation, Mr. Tony Elumelu, said it was time to put food on the table at an affordable price.
Elumelu, who expressed appreciation to the President for appointing him a member of the Council, said that President Tinubu called for an improvement of daily oil production.
He said with the full participation of the private sector in Tinubu’s government, things would improve for better and more jobs created.
Similarly, president of the Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote, said that the Council will sit down and advise the government on the kind of policies to implement for the good of the people.
He said that the private sector will invest heavily in the economy in order to create jobs, adding that the economy could be turned around within months.
