Peter Obi to Buhari: 'You can't use infrastructure to improve the economy'

Ex-Governor of Anambra State and PDP vice presidential candidate in the 2019 elections, Peter Obi, has condemned President Muhammadu Buhari's policy of trying to stimulate the Nigerian economy by erecting and renovating critical infrastructure.

Since 2015, the Buhari administration has embarked on an infrastructure rebuilding and renovation drive as a cornerstone of its economic revival policy.

Roads and railways are being constructed at a frenetic, unprecedented pace and the administration has also embarked on a borrowing spree to fund these projects.

"You can't use infrastructure to drive economic growth," Obi lectures during an AriseTV breakfast programme. "You invest in education and the SME (Small, Medium Enterprises) sector instead to deal with poverty," he adds.

Obi cites Bangladesh, Philippines and Pakistan as some of the countries who have invested in education to drive their economies, saying the Buhari administration would be better off focusing on the right kind of monetary policies to resuscitate an economy hard-hit by the COVID-19 pandemic and a slump in the price of oil in the global market.

"Taking people out of poverty is not magic," Obi adds.

Nigeria is the poorest nation in the world, with more than half of its estimated 200 million population surviving on less than a dollar a day.