Nigeria resumes development plan three years after

Three years after Nigeria abandoned its strategic development plan, the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration looks set to marshal out a new development framework for the country.

In line with the federal government’s commitment to this vision, it has already conceptualised a new Medium Term Successor Strategic Plan (MTSS 2016 – 2020) according to the Federal Ministry of Budget and National Planning.

In a statement issued on Thursday in Abuja, the Ministry’s spokesman, Mr. Salisu Badamasi Haiba, shortly after the inauguration of a Technical Working Group (TWG) recalled that Nigeria’s immediate past medium term plan, tagged: ‘National Implementation Plan (NIP) 2010 – 2013’ expired in 2013.

Ripples was reliably informed that in the past eight weeks, officials of the Ministry of Budget and National Planning had been working closely with other MDAs to review previous plans and macroeconomic framework in addition to identifying key policies and strategic programmes to feed into the 2016 federal budget.

While shedding light on the Technical Working Group, made up of directors and other officials of the ministry and its parastatals namely, the Nigerian Institute of Social & Economic Research (NISER), Centre for Management Development (CMD) and National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the Ministry’s Permanent Secretary, Mrs. Fatima Nana Mede said the group is expected to work out modalities for the processes and system.

She said: “As you are aware, the development of the National Development Plan is the core mandate of the Ministry of Budget & National Planning which is expected to drive the change agenda of the present administration.

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“Experience has shown that the implementation of credible medium-term plan is critical to the success of any country”, Mrs. Mede stated, adding that several emerging nations adopt the use of development plans as basis for improving their economies.”

Mrs. Mede further emphasised the need for the ministry’s personnel to keep abreast of evolving global developments, adding that they also need to work harder towards facilitating the success of the current administration.

Four major areas that will be covered by the technical teams involved in the exercise include updating of the draft report on the review of the immediate past plan of 2010-2013 along with a review of Nigeria’s draft macro-economic framework, in the light of the oil price shocks and recent developments in the global economy.

The other areas cover development of narratives guiding the policy thrust and strategic programmes for the plan as well as facilitating stakeholders’ review and validation of the revised report on the immediate past plan, the revised macroeconomic framework for the medium term plan and narratives guiding the policy thrust and strategic programmes for the plan.

Nigeria’s first National Development Plan was an ambitious economic plan that was launched in 1962 with a six year target that envisaged the spending of about $1,900,000,000 on development and productivity-enhancing projects as suggested by experts from United Nations, Ford Foundation and Nigeria’s Ministry of Economic Development.

After the First National Development Plan (1962), the Second National Development Plan (1970-74), Third National Development Plan (1975-80), and Fourth National Development Plan 1981-85, Nigeria jumped from the use of rolling plans to ambitious programmes such as National Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (NEEDS) and later, Vision 20:2020 which is a perspective plan that aims to make Nigeria a fully developed economy by the year 2020.

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