…says Africa can turn supply chain disruptions, trade protectionism, into opportunities for economic transformation
The Vice President, Senator Kashim Shettima, has said the courageous and unavoidable reforms being undertaken by the administration of President Bola Tinubu, which are currently fixing Nigeria’s structural weaknesses, were proof of the power of political will in economic policy.
This came as he called on African nations to embrace the knowledge economy, describing it as a bridge to transform the continent’s economic growth and development through productivity beyond outdated explanations.
The Vice President, who stated this on Tuesday in Abuja during the opening session of the 66th Annual Conference of the Nigerian Economic Society (NES), noted that while Nigeria was not immune to the economic morass Africa had long been enmeshed in, the nation’s comforting prospect was that it currently has a President with a listening ear.
“Nigeria is, of course, not exempt from Africa’s economic tragedies. But our silver lining is the listening ear of His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Under his leadership, this administration has embarked on bold and inevitable reforms to address structural weaknesses that others before us only paid lip service to.
“These reforms testify to the power of political will in economic policy. Their painful but necessary consequences remind us that a malignant disease can only be cured by painful surgery. The wounds are temporary, but the recovery is permanent,” he stated.
Shettima stressed the need for African nations to get rid of the old-fashioned approach to their economy and embrace structural transformation if they must revive human capital challenges and reverse unemployment on the continent.
He said, “We live in a world where a random citizen in Daura can outsource his services to a corporation in Dallas without seeing the inside of a plane or leaving his bedroom. But to catch up with this changing world, Africa must embrace structural transformation that reinvents its human capital and reverses unemployment.
“Poverty must be confronted head-on for the promise of this continent to be realised in the lives of our people. There is no justification for the low per capita income that afflicts our nation amidst the resources at our disposal.”
Shettima observed that though “geopolitical conflicts, trade protectionism, supply chain disruptions, the energy transition, and the disruptive rise of artificial intelligence” may all seem like threats to the continent’s economy, they are opportunities in disguise.
“They all paint a gloomy outlook. But each threat is also an opportunity in disguise. This is why a society such as yours exists: to light the path of a continent even in the darkest night,” he explained, just as he pointed out it is the mandate that the Annual Conference of the Nigerian Economic Society has been given “to find new pathways to solutions,” while the nation awaits the recommendations.
He noted that while the Tinubu administration did not claim the ongoing reforms would be easy, it has always acknowledged the inflationary impact of the reforms as well as the “spillovers from global crises into our economy,” which explains why President Tinubu “has remained committed to investment-friendly measures and social protection programmes to cushion the vulnerable.
“Policies in transportation, healthcare, and education have been deliberately targeted at reducing inequality because these are the sectors that affect the weakest among us,” he added.
The Vice President commended the President of the Nigerian Economic Society, Prof. Adeola Adenikinju and his team for challenging the nation to reflect on what decades of policy failures and vulnerabilities to global risks have created for Africa.
“I urge all participants to take their role in this conference not as a scholarly exercise but
