There appears to have been a total contrast between the type of fanfare that welcomed the emergence of Muhammadu Buhari as president in 2015 and his return in 2019.
In 2015, some members of the elite class, including former President Olusegun Obasanjo, danced to celebrate the victory. Some market indices such as the Nigerian Stock Exchange All-Share Index also reacted to the success.
Following the declaration of Buhari as the winner of the presidential election in 2015 and the immediate acceptance of the result by Goodluck Jonathan, the Nigerian Stock market recorded a big rise.
It was reported that at the close of trading then, the market capitalisation of the listed equities surged by N904bn or 8.4 per cent from N10.717tn to N11.621tn, with the Nigerian Stock Exchange All-Share Index also rising by 8.4 per cent or 2,635.32 points to close at 34,380.14 points.
But such depth of euphoria and enthusiasm across board appears to be lacking in 2019 re-election. Everywhere looks calm.
The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in the early hours of last Wednesday declared Buhari winner of the presidential election, securing a second term in office.
With Buhari’s win, the question is, will things including economic condition change for better or remain the same with recorded increase in poverty and unemployment.
“With Buhari’s return, the business community is not expecting anything different, instead investors are trying to adjust to cope with the president’s economic policies”, says an analyst who prefers anonymity.
Earlier business operators had told BusinessDay that if President Muhammadu Buhari eventually won, the economic situation might remain the same. But they argued that if Abubakar Atiku, his main opposition emerged winner, it might take some time before his policies would begin to impact on the economy.
As the nation prepared for the elections, many organisations shelved some critical business decisions and plans, waiting for the outcome of the elections.
However, some experts expect Buhari to rejig his team for better economic management in his second four-year tenure. “He should continue to pursue his anti-corruption agenda but he should set up economic management team to drive growth”, the analyst said.
Recently, MAN tasked the current administration to double its efforts on infrastructure improvement. It also told the government to consider partnering with the private sector to speed up action. This is to further stimulate Nigeria’s economy and its growth trajectory from the present 2.4 percent last quarter against 1.8 percent, in the period before.
Though the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan of the present administration is focused on tackling the long-existing poor infrastructure such as electricity, rail, roads and ports and improving ease of doing business, MAN insists that further focus and greater attention on the infrastructure in Nigeria will assist its members to create more jobs and improve the GDP.
Stating the position of MAN whose members’ operations are directly affected by poor infrastructure, its president, Mansur Ahmed, estimated that if manufacturing sector’s capacity utilisation could be increased from the present 57 percent on account of improved infrastructure “the amount of new jobs the sector will create immediately would be enormous.
The chief executive officer of Jumia Nigeria, Juliet Anammah has called on the government to prioritize making significant investment in infrastructure development
She emphasised that for Nigeria to win the race to achieving potential economic output growth and its millennium development goals, huge investment must be committed to addressing the infrastructure deficits in the country, because the bulk of most business transactions – citing Jumia as an example – depend heavily on logistics.
Daniel Obi
