Market forces can never stabilise Naira — Oshiomhole

Senator Adams Oshiomhole on Tuesday opined that since market forces are unable to stabilise the naira, government intervention is necessary.

In the black market, the naira trades for around N1,000 to the dollar and N1,200 to the pound months after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) released the currency.

However, Oshiomhole urged the government to step in to protect the nation’s currency while speaking on the Senate floor during the screening of Yemi Cardoso, the CBN’s choice for governor, and four other deputies.

“The challenge we deal with now is everybody seems to have submitted completely to the so-called market forces and rely on the invisible eyes of Adams Smith to regulate and determine the value of the naira,” he said Tuesday.

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“It is now clear, after Babangida started the devaluation, that the market forces can never stabilise the naira. The state must intervene.”

The former Edo State governor wondered how the manufacturing sector of the nation’s economy would grow when the interest rate is on the high side.

“Interest rate cannot be at 20 or 25 per cent and you are expecting the manufacturing sector with investments that require long-term gestation period to grow,” Oshiomhole added.

“Even if you are a drug dealer. You would find that those dealing with drugs in Latin America would be more competitive.

“So, I think there is a need for a complete thinking outside the box. When the West celebrates our free market, no control, and so on, I am always suspicious.

“We need to interrogate our assumptions. We don’t need to copycat Washington and all these international finance capitals. It is their interest [that they are after]. There is no such thing as a common interest,” the former labour chief maintained.

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