David Onwuchekwa, Nnewi
A former Director General of Debt Management Office (DMO), Dr Abraham Nwankwo, has criticized what he called the practice of unitary system in Nigeria’s economic arrangement in a federal system of government.
Nwankwo in his keynote address at Prof Pita Ejiofor second annual frontier lecture and the 2019 Faculty of Management Sciences International Conference held at Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, observed that Nigeria’s political arrangement was federal but its economic arrangement unitary. He, therefore, decried the failure of successive governments to diversify the economy from the current dependence on oil revenue, stressing the urgent need for alternative source of revenue.
His words: “The political arrangement in Nigeria is federalism with three arms of government. But the economic system is unitary. Instead of the states doing their businesses and ensuring the viability of their economy, they simply run to the centre every month to share oil proceeds made from few states.
“Most states as a result of this are denied the opportunity of putting their brains to work, because they can still enjoy money made from other zones.
“Many countries of the world are seeking alternative sources of energy, and Nigeria cannot afford to continue to depend on crude oil export as a major revenue base if we hope to compete in today’s global economy.”
“The non oil sector is dangerously connected to the oil sector, so even when other sectors are contributing significantly to the country’s GDP, you find out that Nigeria is not truly diversified because the non oil sector still depends on the oil sector to work.”
He advised policy makers to emulate countries like Japan, South Korea, Italy, Hong Kong, Singapore, Belgium, Switzerland and Taiwan which, according to him, have no mineral resources, but simply used the brain-based diversification to grow their economy.