Yemisi Izuora
The governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Godwin Emefiele, has raised serious concern over activities of smugglers and dumping of goods, as they have severely posed serious challenges and hindered the success of Nigeria’s economic policies.
Emefiele said this in Ibadan on Friday at the first Distinguished Leadership Lecture of the University of Ibadan with the title ‘ Up Against the Tide: Nigeria’s Heterodox Monetary Policy and the Bretton Woods Consesus’.
Emefiele stated that smuggling and dumping had done more harm to the nation’s economy by impeding investment which would create jobs and reduce poverty.
“Investors insist that the problem of smuggling and dumping must be addressed for them to invest in the nation’s economy.
“How do we deal with these? Government bought hundreds of trucks for Customs to combat it but corruption has prevented us from getting any result.
“This is because of lack of respect for our own economic policies. These acts create unemployment and poverty for our people, that is selfish.
“If we find a company involved in smuggling then we will use our own tools available to us to compliment the efforts of Nigeria Customs.
“Our instrument is to investigate that company and if found involved in smuggling and dumping, we will stop them.
“We will stamp economic sabotage on them and use them as examples to deal with them for people to learn to respect the economic policies of Nigeria.
“We want to create jobs for our people, we want our industries to come alive again,” he said.
Prof. Sam Olofin, the chairman of the occasion, commended the various policies of CBN, noting that Nigeria could not follow the orthodox path to get result.
“Our undue reliance on orthodox has hindered our development. For us to develop, we must be willing to pay the price of going against the tide, ” he said.
Prof. Idowu Olayinka, Vice Chancellor of the university, appreciated the efforts of CBN under Emefiele which had helped in repostioning the nation’s economy.