The Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dr. Dele Alake, has said that Nigeria will soon overcome its current economic hardship.
Alake gave the assurance in a statement by his Special Assistant on Media, Segun Tomori, on Wednesday in Abuja.
He said the hardship was because Nigeria was going through a gestation period of economic restructuring and reforms.
He said that President Bola Tinubu was determined to revamp Nigeria’s economy and put it on a pedestal for sustainable growth through his Renewed Hope agenda.
According to him, the president has a track record of changing the economic tides of a region, just as he did when he was the governor of Lagos State.
“Going down memory lane to the experience in Lagos State, the then governor Tinubu in 1999 met a state that was almost insolvent, with a monthly Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) of N600 million.
“And a wage bill of over N1.1 billion monthly, with little or no resources to cater to infrastructure and other sectors of the economy.
“President Tinubu took similar measures in Lagos as he is taking in Nigeria to turn the tide and financially re-engineer the state. Today, the state has the fifth-largest economy in Africa, bigger than most African countries.
“What we are going through is the gestation period of reforms and policies for economic restructuring, and like the President will say, it is like the throes of pregnancy that a pregnant woman goes through.
“After delivery, she heaves a sigh of relief,“ he said.
The minister urged Nigerians to be patient with the government as the current economic situation would soon stabilise with positive results from on-going reforms.
“For the first time, Nigeria has a president well-versed in public finance. I am confident in this administration’s capacity to diversify the economy, plug leakages, and redirect the economy to a path of sustainable growth.
“The future of this country is extremely bright. What we need to do is exude confidence in our ability and capacity to weather the storm of economic and societal restructuring.
“As we restructure our economy, putting in physical infrastructure, we must also restructure our minds and mental capacity to be on par with physical development.
“So that we can efficiently and judiciously enjoy the benefits of physical development.
“With the cooperation of Nigerians, the tide will turn very soon, and we all will be proud, he said. (NAN)
