A prominent development economist, Prof. Banji Oyelaran-Oyeyinka, has described Nigeria’s Ajaokuta Steel Company as a “monument to unrealised potential,” urging the Federal Government to fully privatise the complex or risk deepening the country’s industrial decline.

The economist made the call at the Virtual International Conference on Ajaokuta, noting that Nigeria has sunk up to $10 billion into the Kogi State plant over four decades without producing a single commercial ton of steel.

“Nigeria continues to import about $4 billion worth of steel annually, while a 1.3 million-tonne plant lies idle. That is not just waste, it is a policy tragedy”, he said.

According to him, the company was designed in the 1970s as the centrepiece of Nigeria’s industrial plan, meant to supply domestic demand, anchor manufacturing, and save billions in foreign exchange, lamenting that it has never reached commercial production.

Oyelaran-Oyeyinka compared Nigeria’s record with China, India and South Korea, where he said deliberate, state-backed investment in steel underpinned rapid industrialisation.

“Steel is the backbone of modern economies. Without it, we import poverty and export jobs,” he told the conference.

He blamed Ajaokuta’s failure on “poor leadership, corruption and chronic policy inconsistency” across successive administrations.

To reverse the trend, the professor called for full privatisation of the steel complex, proposing majority ownership by a “capable Nigerian consortium” working in partnership with experienced global operators.

He suggested that the government should regulate, not run the plant.

Reviving Ajaokuta, he said, could inject up to $14 billion annually into the economy, save nearly $1 billion in forex each year, and create more than 70,000 direct and indirect jobs.

“The time for hesitation has passed. If we are serious about industrial development, steel must come first, and Ajaokuta must work”, he insisted.