Something To Jubilate About? $2 Billion Investment Boost In Nigeria Economy
By Eguko Efetive Oluwadiya
The Bloomberg report recently stated the plan of the International Finance Corporation (IFC); the World Bank’s private-lending arm to boost its investment in Nigeria next year by 25 percent amounting to $2 billion. This was made known by the Country Manager Solomon Adegbie-Quaynor.
The news has since been received with lots of jubilation and heightened expectation that this boost in investment will better our economy, infrastructure base and general standard of life in Nigeria.
NigerianEcho investigations indicate that the funds will be raised directly by the IFC or mobilized from other sources. Adegbie-Quaynor further explained that IFC will work with Nigerian Sovereign Investment Authority and also the search for other institutes to work with for activities in banks, power, gas, transport and agriculture.
Special preference was ascribed to the Power Industry for IFC investment as it has been identified as the largest constraint to private-sector growth in Nigeria. Also on the preference list of investment is the Agriculture industry; Nigeria’s largest employer. IFC seeks to identify ways to link producers to marketers and boost output.
A quick walk down memory lane will show that this is not the first of its kind. In December 2012, the Vice President Namadi Sambo said Nigeria attracted N6.8tn local and foreign direct investment around that time courtesy the investor-friendly policies of the administration of President Goodluck Jonathan. The Vice President noted that such policies made Nigeria the preferred investment destination in Africa ranking as the top five host economies for Foreign Direct Investment and accounting for over 20 per cent of the total FDI inflows into the continent
“Nigeria has become the preferred destination for investment in Africa, ranked in the top five host economies for Foreign Direct Investment, and accounting for over 20 per cent of the total FDI inflows into the continent,” he said.
One would not help but wonder what all these foreign investments have amounted to. One would think that with investment as great as this that Nigeria should be operating on a higher terrain by now with a reasonable state of economy stability.