Mrs. Oby Ezekwesili, has said that the administrations of former President Goodluck Jonathan and that of the incumbent, Muhammadu Buhari, has led the nation’s economy into recession by failing to adopt the right policies to deal with the crash in crude oil prices, which began in mid-2014.
She said, “The parlous state of the Nigerian economy by the 29th of May, 2015 should have instructed an incisive and urgent macroeconomic stabilisation programme to realign the price levels in the economy. By May 2015, we knew we were already in trouble. As a matter of fact, we were already in trouble in 2014. That was the first time that growth collapsed to 3.8 per cent. The incoming administration should not have been told that we were weak and vulnerable.
“Had the government made quick and necessary adjustment that corresponded close enough to the level of impact of the 40 per cent decline in oil revenue, our story could have been different today. We would never have lost growth.”
She added “There is a new level that our post-2014 oil shock economy needed to find for stability. We needed a policy response that could have enabled that adjustment to happen immediately. That response could have helped the economy to absorb the shock. It could have reassured the investors. It could have reassured the consumers. It could have helped us to reasonably retain investor confidence in the economy, but that did not happen.
