The governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El-Rufai, said on Thursday that any president who takes steps to correct fuel cost issues by removing fuel subsidy and tackling foreign exchange obstacles risk not being re-elected for a second tenure as president.
He suggested candidly that the country needs a president who will implement difficult yet necessary measures to fix these issues, not placing interest in being re-elected above solving Nigeria’s economic problems.
Governor El-Rufai stated these in a question-and-answer session during the launch of the World Bank Nigeria Development Update and Country Economic Memorandum which took place at Abuja.
He also said that taking the right measures towards curbing this economic problem should be considered more important than being the next president of the country. With the right policies implemented, Governor El-Rufai insinuated that Nigeria should no longer have the potential to be better but should be better.
His comments read as follows:
“The private sector agrees that these things must be done. The state governments have agreed that these things must be done. The two big elephants are fuel subsidy and the exchange rate and those at the receiving end of this are the private sectors and the sub nationals.
“We have agreed. What we need is a president willing to expend political capital and take risks to reverse the trajectory of this country on a permanent basis even if it costs him the election because the results may not begin to show until after three to five years.”
