By Demi Adeniyi
A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Lagos State Dr Kazeem Olanrewaju Adeyanju, has predicted that the dollar may crash against the Naira by the end of quarter one (Q1), 2024.
Adeyanju, a self-styled political prophet said a number of economic reforms being put in place by the Tinubu administration will make this turn around possible.
Adeyanju who disclosed this while fielding questions from reporters in his Lagos office at the weekend said he foresee the Naira bouncing back to about N500/1USD by March 2024.
The Naira slumped to about N1300 to 1USD last week, but had firmed-up by Monday, exchanging for about N787/1USD.
Adeyanju, the convener of the Think Tinubu Organisation (TTO) one of the Presidential Campaign Support Groups (PCSG), described the dollar scarcity in the economy in recent times as artificial, insisting that a brighter economic outlook is in the horizon once the gains of the fundamentals being put in place by the administration begins to come on stream.
He listed the fundamentals already put in place by the administration to include; the tax reform, the CBN reform, the forex reform, the Naira reform and the economic reform, adding that these are the foundation upon which the nation ought to have built its economic development.
He said “That is why I can boldly say that with all these in place, let’s give him till February or latest March next year and we shall see that the dollar will crash to about N500. I can assure you that because those bottlenecks that promote its scarcity are being addressed.”
He also called on Nigerians to give the Tinubu administration at least one year to get its acts together. “Let us just give the President one year before we start taking him to task. I believe he is committed to reworking Nigeria and to make Nigeria start working for Nigerians,” he said.
Adeyanju wondered why the Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, will refuse to recognise and congratulate President Bola Ahmed Tinubu after the verdict of the Supreme Court affirming the latter’s victory in the 2023 presidential election.
The Supreme Court had last Thursday, upheld President Tinubu’s victory in the February 23, 2023 presidential election. The court threw away the PDP and the Labour Party’s Presidential candidates’ petitions.
Adeyanju, who took exception to Atiku’s continued hard stance against the victory of President Tinubu, said the Islamic faith to which Atiku subscribes believed that: “power belongs to God and He gives it to whosoever he pleases.”
Adeyanju, one of the party’s leading lights in Agege, and one of Tinubu’s long standing followers (since 1993), knocked the PDP strongman for acting like “a sore loser,” and wondered why a statesman like Atiku, a former Vice President of the country, would fritter away the last of his goodwill and dump the sportsmanship spirit of politics.
He said: “I least expected Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, a longtime political associate of the President and one who had benefited from Tinubu’s large heart, when he once offered him the Action Congress (AC), platform in 2007 to be blowing such hot airs over the 2023 election.
“Nigerians are beginning to suspect Atiku Abubakar. Why is he crying more than the bereaved? Is it by force to rule Nigeria? His hostility even after the Supreme Court’s verdict is unbecoming of a statesman. While admitting that Atiku has the right to air his opinion, yet as a statesman, he ought to accept the verdict by the highest court in the land, congratulate the winner and move on.”
With the conclusion of all petitions against the electoral victory of the President, Adeyanju urged the President to declare a state of emergency on job creation.
He said the nation has a very large army of unemployed youths, about 60 percent of the population. It is so alarming that the government must partner small enterprises to create jobs.