Nigeria could develop and generate $30 billion on export of textile materials

BEING AN INTERVIEW WITH SENATOR JIBRIL WALI, the Sarkin Fulani, Nassarawa state; Acting Chairman Zamfara Textiles, Management Executive of the United Nigerian Textiles, Chairman of Nigeria Employers Consultative Association of the 19 Northern state, People’s Democratic Party (PDP) Board of Trustee Secretary recently spoke with Lola Seriki- Idahosa on how smuggling activities and counterfeiting of the country products in other country ruin our industries, he also proffer solution on how the textiles industries can bounce back again.

Q: Sir, what is responsible for the total closure of textiles industry in the country?
Jibril: You see, the situation in the Nigerian textiles industry is very sympathetic in the way that when you look at the industry in the eighties, when we were employing 300,000 workers with 175 textiles factories I Nigeria. But today, we have about 32,000 to 34,000 workers and we are reduced to about 36 textiles factories which are epileptic and just managing to exist. So, this situation is very sympathetic.

Q: So, why were they closed down?
Jibril: This is what I am telling you. I was just giving you the history before the closure, because you have to understanding what was it before and why we were closing now. The present has affected a lot of business in Nigeria.

The closure was primarily caused by smuggling activities and counterfeiting of our product which is the copy right of our designs and trade mark printed in Asian countries and brought back to Nigeria and sold at cheaper price.

About 95 per cent of fabrics sold at Jankara market, Kano, Onitsha, Lagos are imported materials while our own is just about five per cent.

Also, the manufacturing cost as the cost of raw material cotton is unreliable, the issue of generating electric power as we operate 24 hours and need that long power time. But NEPA (PHCN) gives us power for seven hours only. This has caused us to purchase generating sets which are costly plus the management of it. We use diesel which is also costly and not easily available, causing most of our production to be on generators.

Furthermore, are the wages and salaries that are being increased, rent and so on apart from the manufacturing cost that is there. We have the problem of Black Oil which used to be a real problem for us due to its price increase from N10 per litre to N24:50k and N81. And transporting it from Warri to Kano, it will reach between N90 and N100 per litre.

Gas is used in the Southern part of Nigeria and with the overhaul in the NNPC, there could be a lot of changes now. So, these are the major reasons that made us to close our factories.

Q: What is the way forward now?
Jibril: The government should come up with a realistic textiles policy that would take care of our needs to make us survive. This textiles policy should include tax holiday for some years for us and the kind of system that we would want to see in the policy should be very aggressive one that will be meaningful and will serve the textiles industry to make us survive, make available our impute in the textiles industry. Cotton is one of the raw materials we us in the textiles industry and attention has to be seriously given to its growth in Nigeria as the cotton board and its affiliate committees in the Ministry of Agriculture has not 100 per cent solved the problem of brand on cotton. The seeds are not properly selected like it used to
be before. There are imported seeds which we used to classify; the research has to be vigorous and a lot of fertilizer and bronocote have to be used in the system. The grading and marketing of cotton through market system has given way, so we have to follow the farmers to their houses to purchase cotton. Nigerian cotton is one of the poorest because there is no more grading which previously used to be on grade one, two, three and so on.

So, if the government can come out with aggressive textiles policy that will make us survive and grow and make employment easy like we use to have in the industry; that would do a lot.

Q: How much do you think the textiles industry can contribute to our economy?
Jibril: You see, the beginning of the industrial revolution is from the textiles industry. So, if that were so, it is a very important thing as it will solve the foreign exchange through export which we would do a lot. And because of the problem we are in now, there is very less export.

Nigeria could develop as well as generate $30 billion on export of these materials, but the government is now losing the taxes which are chargeable because the industry is closed and this has affected the industry tremendously. Also on the technological know- how, the polytechnics, universities have their students as waste because they cannot work anywhere as there is no textiles industry.

Q: Sir, if you are asked now, what is the quality of our home made textiles?
Jibril: Nigeria textiles fabrics can favourably compete very seriously with the foreign ones because it is the same technology with the same expert that we have which is a crop of good textiles technologists that produce these materials. And we use the same chemicals they use there too.

Our cloths that are said to be of low quality is due to many things like ironing, sunning makes them fade, the chemicals used, the soap and detergent. People do not know these things. So, the quality is very high and there is no way you can say we don’t have qualities in Nigeria.

Q: Do you think that the challenges of the past have been rectified now?
Jibril: How have they been rectified when we have this kind of problem? I hope that the problem will be rectified.

Q: Do you think that we have competent hands to manage the sector in Nigeria?
Jibril: We have crops of competent textiles technologists in Nigeria that even the foreigners learn from. These people are capable of running the Nigeria textiles industry if encouraged with the goodies and benefits. It will help us very much.

Q: What is the situation of the United Nigeria Textiles Limited (UNTL) now after about four years of resuscitation?
Jibril: The situation in the UNTL is the same situation with all the textiles industry in Nigeria. We are experiencing the same problems as I told you. There is no textiles industry today that is kicking well; we are only managing.
In Kaduna here, only two have survived and one is the UNTL here. We used to have 8,000 workers in the eighties and nineties, but we have less than 1,000 now. We are taking steps to manage the situation by managing and rationing work by sending employees on compulsory leave so that they are not declared redundant. I call on them to see reasons for this action as it is in order to save their employment.

Q: Which is the second textiles factory that is working in the state; because you said two but mentioned one—–the UNTL?
Jibril: CHELCO. It is just blanket.

Q: What is your impression about the 27th Annual Education Conference of the NUTGTWN?
Jibril: This is one of the series of activities of the Union. It is to enlighten their members, to bring them up to date and to bring the stakeholders together to hear the difficulties, the interest of the textiles industry. It was well attended. The theme for this year is: General Buhari’s Administration: The Revival of the Textiles Industry and the Increase of Employment in Nigeria.
And with the promises of General Buhari, I am optimistic that the textiles industry will be revived and I want the governors, Adams Oshiomhole was a textiles worker in Arewa Textiles, then a secretary in the NUTGTWN rising to the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) to a governor. Then the Governor of Kaduna state Nasir El-Rufai who before his inauguration, took time to visit the textiles industry and has mastered their problems, and doing all he can to ensure that the industry is revived especially the factories in Kaduna. He has been his best and has promised us power from Gurara, and I think the business life in Kakuri will soon resume.