Presidential candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in the 2023 elections, Prince Adewole Adebayo, has said that President Bola Tinubu’s neo-liberal economic policies would not achieve any result for Nigeria in the next 40 years.
He said the All Progressives Congress (APC) administration led by Tinubu lacked economic policies capable of getting Nigeria out of the woods.
“The main primary objective of a monetary policy in a neo-liberal economy is to achieve full employment. Have they done that? They have not. That is the problem. So, they are not going anywhere. You can give them 40 years, but they are not going anywhere,” Adebayo said in a statement from his media team on Thursday.
He recalled that Tinubu refused to participate in presidential debates leading to the 2023 presidential election, to explain his plans, adding that his ‘Emi l’okan’ declaration, meaning, ‘it’s my turn’, is not an economic philosophy.
“They did not articulate what they wanted to do. They did not understand the implications of the decision they were taking. They do not have the executive capacity to run a neo-liberal economic setting. You can run it, it is an alternative.”
Adebayo, who said political office holders should assume power on the merit of ideas, noted that instead of running a government for the benefit of Nigeria, the current leaders were doing business with Nigerians.
He said: “They are not running the country. They are just doing business. Occasionally they get distracted with governmental duties but their primary duty is business and they think that is why they are trying to run the petroleum industry rather than have a regulatory framework.
“They are not running the economy. They are not running the government. They don’t see you and I as citizens, they see us as customers. They are mercantile in their approach. They see you as a customer since they can get extra money from you by hoarding petrol.
“I can get extra money from you by underfunding public education. So, they are not willing to do anything because they are not ready to comply with chapter 2 of the Constitution, which stipulates how governance should be done in Nigeria.
“Call anybody in the government, they are not responsible for anything, because the minister of water resources is not responsible for whether you have water or not. The minister of education is not responsible for educational outcomes. Whether students fail WAEC, JAMB, he is not responsible.
“The minister of health is not responsible for your life expectancy or medical outcomes. They just carry these titles to enable them to put out their signatures to award. Beyond that, they are not going to do anything,” Adebayo stated.
