The Governor of Bauchi State, Bala Mohammed, has criticized the policies of the federal government, saying that the hardship being faced by Nigerians has shown that the reforms are not impacting positively on the lives of the people.
Mohammed said this at Thursday’s launch of the Nigeria Development Update report by the World Bank in Abuja.
Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, has faced significant economic challenges recently. The administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, which began in May 2023, has implemented a series of policies aimed at addressing long-standing economic issues.
Some of the policies are fuel subsidy removal, interest rate adjustment, tax policy changes and floating of the naira among several others.
However, these policies have also led to increased economic hardship for many Nigerians.
While Tinubu’s administration aims to tackle Nigeria’s economic challenges through reform, the immediate impacts of these policies have led to increased hardship for many Nigerians.
Speaking at the event, Mohammed said that the economic policies of the President Bola Tinubu-led administration were not yielding the desired results.
He said, “Nigerians are not enjoying the regime at this time across the board, not only the federal government, including the state and local governments. Therefore, the onus rests on you, the finance and the managers of the economy.
“We need to come up with a budget programme with economic policies that will reduce hardship. The money that we are sharing is not enough.
“The report spoke about employment, wages, and how many per cent of Nigerians are employed. Most of our people live in the informal sector; we should look at how we can make them self-employed.
“The purchasing power has dwindled; these policies are not working and you know that.”
The lead economist of the World Bank in Nigeria, Alex Sienaert, while speaking on the report said that to achieve the desired growth in the nation’s economy, the recently introduced macroeconomic stabilisation reforms should be backed up by creating productive jobs.