The Katsina State Coordinator of the Jagaban Vision Movement, Ibrahim Musa Kallah, has called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu (PBAT) to declared a state of emergency in the nation’s industrial sector.
Kallah, who spoke with our correspondent on Saturday, said that there is the need to reflect on what happened that led to the present situation in the sector.
He recalled that in the past, when the Nigerian industrial sector was working well, investment in manufacturing sector provided employment opportunities to our youth and provided revenue to the Government and investors.
Kallah further observed that during that era, investment made by both foreigners and Nigerians kept the nation’s economy moving and people were assured of jobs and sources of livelihoods.
Ibrahim Musa who served as member of the Advisory Committee of the Tinubu-Shetima Women Presidential Campaign Council further recalled that during that era, industries like UNTIL Kaduna, UNITEX, Arewa Textile, Steel Rolling Mills, Kaduna Refinery, then NEPA, Nitel and many other corporations industries scattered in Lagos, Onisha, Port Harcourt, Kano and Kaduna, etc, were the hub of economic activities, with people directly or indirectly sustaining their livelihoods through the industrial sector.
Kallah gave an example of Kaduna Textile, which was under the supervision of the then northern states, had approximately over five thousand employees sustaining members of their families.
This, he said, is in addition to thousands of family members and small business owners that were benefiting from the textiles operations.
He said that governments at various levels were getting high revenue from workers’ taxes, including taxes on companies profits and excise duties.
“Unfortunately, while these economic ecosystem took a nosedive, Nigeria turned its attention to the easy but unsustainable revenue from oil.
“Since then, Nigerian turned into rent seeking economic participant and this had led to current economic downturn that we are facing today.
The Coordinator of Jagaban Vision Movement, Katsina State, therefore called on the government of President Tinubu to, not only declare State of emergency on food security, but also on agro-allied industrial sector.
According to him, the people need food but the value chain operations are also critical in revamping the Nigerian economy.
Kallah underscored the need to diversify the economy to ensure available and sustainable food security while the value chain will create more jobs and increase productivity and boost the nation’s economy.
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