Senior lecturer at the Lagos Business School, Dr Doyin Salami, noted yesterday that Nigeria’s inflation was hampering growth, lamenting that the economy had not returned to the pre-naira devaluation era.
Salami, who was one of the panelists at the Nigeria Economic Outlook 2025, organised by the Igbobi College Old Boys’ Association (ICOBA) as part of its Business Breakfast Meeting, held in Victoria Island, Lagos, also lamented that the reforms on the power sector had not yielded positive results.
The discussion focused on the economic outlook for Nigeria in 2025 and what businesses should prepare for.The panelists looked into tax reform, banking, the fintech and telecommunications sector, among others. The programme was sponsored by AO & FA Consulting and Phillip Consulting.
According to Salami, Nigeria’s basic power generation should be one million people to one gigawatt of power, but the country has less than six gigawatts.
“As long as it’s the same, this economy is going nowhere fast; so, we have to decide on what the government should fund and what the private sector should do.
He said inflation was bad for the economy and something must be done to bring it down.
“15 per cent inflation is detrimental to economy, and there is only two ways to bring down inflation: it’s either supply is increased or demand is reduced. The first thing any country does is to trim down demands and hope that the supply push will enable demands to recover.”
Giving her view on the economic outlook for banking and fintech industries, Country Manager, West Africa, Mastercard, Folasade Femi-Lawal, said: “Mastercard economic institute came up with a report, which is exciting. The Nigerian economy is driven by a thriving fintech ecosystem. Nigeria is home to one of the world’s fastest-growing economies. Whether the regulation is taking cognisance of that is a different ballgame, but we have seen a lot of transformation in open banking, and in that, we have seen AI lending and mobile technology thriving. We have also seen more financial inclusion.”
In his remarks, the President of ICOBA, Femi Olubanwo, said: “I am optimistic about the Nigerian economy; the picture does not look good, but I’m confident that Nigerians’ resilience will win through. We will come out on top.”
On how the meeting will shape Nigeria and discussion on the economy, he said: “Because of the strength and the influence of ICOBA in politics, economy and business, it shapes discussions. The more we have this, the same way it changes the narrative and proffer solutions.
Also, Accounting and Audit expert, Olawale Abiola, said: “Looking at what happened in 2024, we could see the results and the benefits of the government’s policies. The tax reform will structure many things. Many businesses will enjoy insensitive. This is the first time in Nigeria we have seen a tax reform not looking at how to penalize but help businesses to grow. This reform is not looking at how to tax the seed but make it grow to bring out fruits.
