THE Lagos chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) has thrown its weight behind the fiscal and monetary policy responses by the government to keep the economy afloat in the face of falling oil prices.In a statement, LCCI Director-General Mr. Muda Yusuf said the fiscal and monetary policy responses by the government and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) were inevitable, stressing that some of the policies were long overdue.He said: The economic situation has again underlined the critical imperative of economic diversification. An economy that is diversified has a better capacity to withstand shocks. At every turn in our advocacies, we have canvassed the need for the creation of an enabling environment to enhance the productivity of enterprises and consequently ensure economic diversification.On the measures, he said they included fiscal and monetary policies taken to stabilise the macro-economic conditions to minimise dislocations.These, he said, include reduction in international travels and trainings by Federal Government officials, tax on luxury items, and review of oil price benchmark to $73 from $78 in the 2015 Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF).Others are renewed commitment to fiscal prudence, upward revision of revenue target for Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) and the Nigeria Customs Service.Yusuf said on the monetary policy front, some items, such as electronics, finished goods, information technology, generators, telecommunications equipment, and invisible transactions, were excluded from the official foreign exchange window.The LCCI said the implication is that transactions involving the enumerated items would be funded at a higher exchange rate from either the interbank foreign exchange market or parallel market.He recommended that several budget heads needed to be further scrutinised to ensure cost effectiveness and better transparency in the management of public finance. According to him, they include the: consolidated revenue fund charges, service wide votes, presidential amnesty programmes, capital supplementation and debt services.Others are refreshments and meals, foodstuffs and catering, honorarium and sitting allowance, welfare packages, repairs and maintenance. All these budget heads have substantial amounts voted for them in the budget annually. Some of the provisions do not reflect the desired prudence in the management of public funds. Huge savings will be made if a proper scrutiny of the budget heads is made, he warned.Yusuf regretted that the biggest platform for corruption in the economy today is the management of subsidy on petroleum products. The pressure it exerts on the government treasury is enormous, he warned.He called for an accelerated reform of the oil and gas sector and the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB), which he said will mitigate the challenge the subsidy management poses for government finance.Furthermore, he cautioned that the tax yield in the economy is not commensurate to the magnitude of activities taking place in the economy.The property market in theLekki area of Lagos, Nigeriascommercial nerve centre, is experiencing an unprecedented boom, with rising demand pushing up property prices, The Nation has learnt.The development is said to be in anticipation of the coming on stream of the proposed $9 billion Dangote Refinery and Petrochemical Company in the area, as well as other petrochemical companies scrambling to buy land in the area.Since Dangote Group awarded the project management consultancy, engineering and construction management of its 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) (20 million tonnes) oil refinery and 600,000 tonnes polypropylene plant, the Lekki corridor of Lagos and its environs have not been the same again. The area, which used to have a narrow single-lane road and notorious traffic congestion, is fast becoming a global business haven with a new dual carriageway with three lanes on both sides.On account of these, the multi-billion naira investment and the economic activities it is expected to spur in and around the Lekki Free Trade Zone (LFTZ) was one of the issues that came up at this yearsTokyo Annual Conference of International Bar Association in Tokyo, Japan in October. The plant, which would be one of the biggest in Africa after completion, generated so much interest among foreign investors at the conference. The consensus was that it would be a big investor attraction to Nigeria and Africa.This is why property prices in that area have soared by over 100 per cent from what it was late last year. Experts in real estate attribute this to the influx of people to Lekki. This made the value of property in the area very high, as prospective property owners scramble for residential apartments and office spaces.]]>
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