Nigerians should henceforth
look forward with optimism. And to achieve this future, Nigeria does not need
to borrow. This was the position of the visiting. Managing Director of
International Monetary Fund (IMF), Christine Lagarde as she declared that
measures so far taken by President Muhammadu Buhari’s government to revive the
economy were quite promising. But she noted that
Nigeria needed to show more flexibility and stronger discipline in the
implementation of its fiscal policies.
Lagarde spoke after
meeting with the president and his economic team including Vice President Yemi
Osinbajo and the Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, her counterpart in the
Budget and National Planning, Udoma Udo Udoma and the Central Bank of Nigeria
(CBN) Governor Godwin Emefiele. She used the occasion to
clear the air about the public perception of IMF as an anti-people institution,
noting that her visit to the country along side her team was to work with the
leadership to come out with the appropriate fiscal mechanism that would help
the economy.
She disclosed that IMF’s
evaluation team would visit the country next week to scrutinise the 2016 budget
currently before the National Assembly with a view to coming out with a
response and guide the country accordingly, noting that the fund had no policy
of interference with how member-countries run their fiscal policies.
She dismissed
speculations that the fund came to negotiate on how Nigeria may obtain fresh
loans with stringent conditions, noting that Nigeria had no need for loans,
though insisting that the administration must work on fiscal discipline.
(The Guardian)
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