₦airaland Forum

Rgp92:
Murtala Muhamad have been dead for 35 years now. Please lets forget this and move on

Aganga’s curious auto industry strategy

Olusegun Aganga. His body language seems to say ‘bury the indigenous auto makers in Nigeria.’

First, as Minister of Trade and Investment, he granted a waiver (allegedly) to an Indian firm to import over 200,000 (two hundred thousand) fully built-up Volkswagen Sport Utility Vehicles (SUVs) in the country. He denied the report as an allegation in a national newspaper (Not BusinessDay).

The Director General of NAC, Aminu Jalal admitted, according to a newspaper report, that he was aware that the waiver was a proposal put forward by an auto import company as a precondition for them to open a vehicle producing plant in the country.

Jalal was quoted as saying that the Minister of Trade and Investment sent the request to them to look at and comment.

“We met with the company and told them that the incentives they are clamouring for are good and are the same that we have been advocating in the past, like increase in tariffs for FBUs but we objected to their request of duty-free importation.”

Second, he has happily announced that another Indian group have submitted proposal to establish auto assembly plants in Nigeria.

All that news sends mixed and unsettling signals to the already existing indigenous auto makers struggling amidst some strange policies that have hindered their progress thus far. It says to them that his priority is to strengthen the competitive advantage of emerging market auto makers, like India and China, which they already have, to the detriment of Nigeria auto makers like Innoson, Peugeot Automobile and National Truck Manfacturers (NTM).

Wrong strategy. Nigeria should at this period be trying to put in place policies that will encourage and position the automotive sector by stimulating the existing cadre of privately-owned manufacturers to help re-energise the economy.

The ministry of trade and investment should be doing more to look towards even India and China and follow their approach with commitment to making manufacturing a more central part of the economy. One way to do this is to refocus the banking system to create a pool of fund among themselves to provide finance for local auto manufacturers.

There are four or five banks and few other financial institutions that can be co-opted to lend to even the ancillary manufacturers to help them build up capacity and even sales over a long time.

While Innoson is the biggest indigenous auto maker in the country, research by BusinessDay has shown that in the past two years they have struggled to sell up to 1000 unit of their bus, which compares in terms of quality with those imported by foreign auto traders in the country despite their financial commitments.

Again, PAN has continued to suffer from myriad of issues, ranging from sales to financing challenges while these foreign groups enjoy massive waivers and subsidy provided by the federal government.

PAN is currently producing less than 20 cars daily and on the verge of retrenching about 5000 workers from their plants. Their woe is re-enforced by lack of government patronage and the huge cost of doing business in Nigeria. Its entire production line is decaying and under-utilised.

The likes of Anambra Motor Manufacturing Company (ANAMMCO), once jointly owned by the Nigerian Government and the Mercedes Benz of Germany, South Eastern states, and some Nigerians and Volkswagen of Nigeria has since closed shop.

No doubt, auto manufacturing is key in any effort to rebalance the economy away from a dependence on oil. Its importance in terms of job creation can not be over-emphasized. Supporting its sustainability therefore should not be a question of lip-service but a concrete effort towards re-assuring stakeholders that any further allusion to foreign competitor or the encouragement of fully fitted vehicles into the country does not mean a death knoll for local manufacturers.

mikron:
@blink182 wetin com concern MC loph death with the state of the nation? In as much as the news of his death is shocking it would be wise if we blame mr death 4 snatching mc loph instead of speaking the way u just did. Abi accident no dey happen 4 other countries?

M M M:
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[b]is oliver a christian song Becos our choir sang d song last 3 $unday

Eko Ile:
What's you misguided and irrelevant rubbish got to do with anything?  What ever this irrelevant new agency was created for has nothing to do with power generation or transmission, it's basically saying we have government money to give away to any player with any filed claim of business related loss. Business is a game of win or lose and when businesses win, do they pay their win to the government or the tax payers? No they don't.

This pointless policy stands only to assure and give our money to worthless entities resolvable for putting us in darkness, not to generate and transmit 1 extra MW of power.

Private entities know how to invest, operate and make profit, we don't need the government standing at the gate with new red tapes and our money to guarantee failure by crooked and incompetent people. Where is the incentive to do good and deliver when taxpayers money is waiting for you to collect? There is risk in everything we do in life, even the gala seller is not immune to risk, so who is guaranteeing his risk?

About Fashola. Obviously, you are too gullible to see beyond your nose. He built 2 IPPs not overnight, but within 2 years and not in decades with 30 billion dollars and still continued darkness.  Too bad he didnt have the 30 billion dollars to electrify the whole of Nigeria like these incompetent and corrupt people.

This new gimmick is only telling some people that government money is available to reward them for failure.

Btw, the new power policy he unveiled was to deregulate and get the government out of the power sector right? So why are they staking a whole new agency to keep the in the game for good with our money to give away?

Eko Ile:
This single act alone just nailed us back to square one. Nigeria is realy a funny animal with dangerouly cruel, clueless and incompetent people. This is the government road block and red tape, the new corrupt government agency with authority to guarantee and pay for or waste our money on a broken sytem the government created and continue  create.

The question is,  Why are they reinserting themselves into what they really should be getting out of? Obviously, there is too much money tied to the power sector, the same money these corrupt people are not ready to give up. With billions of budgeted dollars every year, the power sector remains the most lucrative avenue of corruption for these corrupt people and I'm really not suppriced they are setting up another supper agency to protect their corruption pipeline.

Our federal government is to corrupt and  incompetent to make anything work in Nigeria. They have zero business in the utility sector, their only foot print should be one single unit within the existing trade or commerce ministry regulating the sector, not the tons of agency duplicating themselves and acting as stumbling blocks to our national development.

When we see states like Lagos with serious plans on the table and the way they've built 2 IPPs within months to guarantee steady power supply to hospitals and government institutions with dedicated underground cables,  It shows what serious Nigerians are capable of doing, unfortunately, our own federal government is the enemy standing in our way and keeping us in darkness and with this new and duplicating irrelevant government agency, they just opined to us that we are going to remain in darkness.


Until these corrupt and incompetent people wash their hands off and let go the power sector

eGuerrilla:
@OP The title of this thread is rather misleading and should be changed, don't you think? In the article referenced, we are informed the buses are worth #2 Million less than their Japanese equivalent, and not quite what you've implied.