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ABUJA (Reuters) – Nigeria's main opposition candidate, Atiku Abubakar, said on Monday he would increase investment in the oil sector, cut costly fuel subsidies and double the size of the economy by 2025 if he wins the presidential elections next year.
PHOTO: Atiku Abubakar, a former Vice President, attends the National Convention of the Democratic People's Party (PDP) of Nigeria, in the city of Port Harcourt, in the southern Niger Delta, Nigeria, on October 6 2018. REUTERS / Tife Owolabi / Photo File
The businessman and former vice president ran as a private sector champion as he published his manifesto and outlined plans to prevent incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari from running for a second term in February.
There are few reliable opinion polls in Nigeria, the largest oil producer in Africa. But Abubakar is seen as a major competitor to Buhari, a former military leader who has suffered many defections, oversaw a crumbling economy and fought to contain militant violence in the northeast.
The opposition candidate for the Democratic People's Party (PDP) is, like Buhari, a northerner – but analysts say his business experience, particularly in port logistics, has earned him supporters among the Southern business elite.
"I will be proactive in attracting investment and supporting Nigeria's 50 million small and medium-sized businesses to double the size of our GDP to $ 900 billion by 2025," Abubakar said in a video message.
"These investments will create at least 2.5 million jobs a year and lift at least 50 million people out of poverty in the first two years," he added.
In the manifesto, Abubakar said it would privatize government-owned oil refineries, issue new licenses for unprecedented refinery investments, and consider reintroducing tender calls for marginal fields and blocks. of oil.
The plan, says the manifesto, would ensure that Nigeria refines half of its current crude output by about 2 million barrels a day by 2020.
OIL
Nigeria remains largely dependent on oil sales, which account for about two-thirds of state revenue. But it hardly refines its crude, exporting rather what it produces and paying to import refined products – a considerable loss for the wealth of the country.
Abubakar said it would eliminate subsidies on imported fuels and let the market determine the price, a potentially risky strategy in a country where even rumors of rising prices triggered violence.
The candidate is also committed to investing $ 90 billion in infrastructure each year over the next five years and to put in place a $ 20 billion fund to fund infrastructure projects. .
He said that he would sign the African continental free trade agreement. Mr Buhari has so far stood apart from the pact at the continental level, saying that he wanted to conduct broader consultations.
The Abubakar manifesto reiterated its plan for partial privatization of the Nigerian state oil company, the National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
The Buhari government tried to keep tight control over exchange rates as the naira weakened in the face of declining world oil prices.
Abubakar's manifesto stated that exchange rate control was a problem. But he stopped saying when he was going to finish them.
Buhari – who became in 2015 the first opposition candidate to overthrow a president through the ballot box – promised to continue his campaign against corruption.
Report by Alexis Akwagyiram in Lagos and Paul Carsten in Abuja; Edited by John Stonestreet and Andrew Heavens
