EXCITING NEWS: TNG WhatsApp Channel is LIVE…
Subscribe for FREE to get LIVE NEWS UPDATE. Click here to subscribe!
The opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described the N27.5 trillion 2024 fiscal year proposed by President Bola Tinubu to the National Assembly as deceitful and hopeless.
PDP, in a statement by its spokesman, Hon. Debo Ologunagba, said the budget has no mechanism for economic recovery, adding that the N750/$ is suffocating.
The statement reads : “The 2024 budget is filled with heavily padded figures, duplicated items and several false statistics including claims of global increase in inflation rate as excuse for an impending excruciating increase in taxes and interest rate to the detriment of our productive sector.
“It is clear that the 2024 budget as proposed with its heavy provisions for luxury appetite of the presidency and All Progressives Congress (APC) leaders, which is predicated and expected to be funded from multilateral and bilateral foreign loans and increased taxes on Nigerians, is designed to further mortgage our nation and strangulate the already impoverished Nigerians.
“The budget framework with respect to recurrent expenditure vote of N9.9 trillion, capital expenditure vote of N8.7 trillion and N8.25 trillion for debt services is unsustainable and unrealizable in view of the stated outstanding debt and proposed borrowing which is targeted mainly to finance consumption, luxury appetite and debt servicing.”
The party said that the lack of concrete and verifiable action plans to revive the manufacturing, energy, agricultural and education sectors, which are the main drivers of any economy, is a pointer that the Tinubu-led APC government is bereft of ideas and completely disconnected from the reality of life being faced by Nigerians.
The statement noted that it is of grave concern that the president in the budget speech stated that his government has “adopted a naira to US dollar exchange rate of N750 per US dollar for 2024.”
“This is a clear admission of failure, incapacity and lack of direction by the APC administration to manage and grow the economy in such a way as to strengthen the national currency, productivity and competitiveness in the global market.
“It has further confirmed that the numerous promises by the president and officials of his government asserting a monetary policy to strengthen the naira have been a deceptive ploy which is consistent with the APC in the past eight and half years.
“By adopting a defeatist N750 per US dollar exchange rate, President Tinubu has further plunged our economy into the abyss, weakened our productive sector, wrecked the purchasing power of Nigerians and the capacity of the youths to be creative, recognising that it will be almost impossible for Small and Medium Enterprises as well as startups to access capital under such a suffocating budget.”