Chidi Samuel|Professor Charles Soludo, the former governor of Nigeria’s central bank on Tuesday said that the country must innovate, compete or die as you cannot build a 100 story building on a foundation of an old bungalow.
The former CBN governor who was recently named in the newly constituted Economic Advisory Council by President Buhari stated this while giving a speech at The Platform, an annual programme organised by the Covenant Christian Centre, Lagos.
Soludo, who hailed the signing of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AFCFTA) by the federal government, however, insisted that the country must completely shift from depending on oil sale as a source of revenue.
According to him, the world was already on the fourth industrial revolution with the digital economy while Nigeria was struggling with the basic stages of growth.
He said, “The implication (of the signing) is that insularity will no longer be an option; the name of the game of the future in an increasingly integrated world is innovate, compete or die.”
“While electric cars are fast replacing diesel and petrol cars, many of our people are still building petrol stations.
“The ordinary people who can’t explain what has hit them resort to all sorts of criminal activities to survive. Economic structuring will entail thinking through the alternative scenarios and mapping out to alternative possible proactive responses.”
The former apex bank governor also further stated that the country must improve its legal institutional foundation, which according to him, was designed for the consumption of oil rent.
“The link between law, constitution, institution, and judiciary and the economic transformations seems to be the weakest link in our design of national agenda,” he said.
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