The Federal Government, yesterday, debunked claims that in some quarters that the economic policies of the country are being dictated by the International Monetary Fund, IMF and the World Bank.
This denial is coming on the heels of insinuations that President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration devalued the naira twice in the space of 6 months because he was doing the bidding of the two international financial institutions.
Speaking on the devaluation of the naira, the Minister of State for Finance, Dr. Bashir Yuguda said the naira was devalued because government discovered that it was inevitable.
Yuguda, who spoke in a lecture at the National Defence College, Abuja, said: “Nobody is dictating to us as a government. Our donor friends can advise us but we are not bound to take such advice.”
Speaking further, the minister said the step was taken so as to avoid the depletion of the nation’s foreign reserves to an unsustainable level.
Yuguda also argued that the economy had performed well under the present administration despite the challenges of low oil prices.
This, he said can be attested to by global rating agencies such as Fitch, as well as Standard & Poors.
He said: “if you look at the outcome of rating agencies such as Standard and Poors, while all the 11 OPEC members economy forecast were downgraded including Saudi Arabia, Nigeria was never placed under negative watch. For the last three years, the issue of devaluation never happened until the recent fall in oil prices which made the CBN to devalue for us to take advantage and shore up revenue from non-oil sector through diversification to non-oil exports. So we are watching keenly and CBN will take the appropriate steps”.
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