Shubham Chaudhuri, the Country Director of World Bank, has revealed that Nigeria’s economy is in jeopardy because of the lack of capital infrastructure and basic development needs in the country.
In an interview with Punch, where he made this known, the World Bank boss said Nigeria doesn’t have the revenues to finance her capital infrastructure and basic development needs, adding that the country’s potentials are tremendous.
His words: “Nigeria has so much potential but it has not been realised. To realise the potential, there must be investments in capital infrastructure and in basic development needs.
“Right now, Nigeria does not have the revenues to finance it. We have seen in some reports that Nigeria has the lowest level of government revenue to GDP among some major countries, but we have some other countries too.
“But if you compare them to the rule of thumb on how much the government needs to spend in order to provide the basic functions of law and order-basic services and basic infrastructure-the rule of thumb is usually between 15% and 20%.
“Nigeria, in the last few years, has been spending about 12% of the GDP. It means if your revenue is seven to 8% of the GDP, and you are making an effort to spend about 12%; you are already encouraging fiscal deficit which means an overall debt.
“However, that might be worth it if the public spending is in the right places. Nigeria has huge potential and we see this potential in two ways.
“Nigeria is the largest economy in sub-Saharan Africa, and you see the dynamism and the energy of the people. And if things were a bit more conducive to mobilising the energy, the potential is tremendous. I also see in it terms of Nigerians in the Diaspora-Nigerians who grow up in Nigeria and then at an individual level go abroad.
“In the United States, Nigerians are the most educated. It used to be the Indians but Nigeria has overtaken India in that regard.”
