#Economic Crisis: Ex Gov. Oshiomhole & Ex Gov. Soludo Fights Dirty In Public b

The tension between former governor of Edo State, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole and former CBN governor, Soludo have not been this heightened before. It was indeed a war of words yesterday at the Vanguard Economic Discourse in Lagos when a former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Prof. Charles Soludo, and the immediate past Governor of Edo State, Mr. Adams Oshiomhole, engaged each other in heated argument....


The duo stunned the audience as they exchanged crude words during a discussion session moderated by the founding Group Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Guaranty Trust Bank, Mr. Fola Adeola. Soludo, who gave a keynote speech on the topic, ‘The hard facts to rescue the Nigerian economy’, had earlier cited some of the areas President Muhammadu Buhari had failed, Vanguard reports.


Soludo said nothing much would be achieved with the 2017-2020 Economic Recovery and Growth Plan, which was released by the Federal Government last week. In Soludo's words:

“Whose plan is it? Ownership will determine whether the plan is just a public relations document or whether it will be implemented. To what extent is the plan consistent with the APC manifesto, which promised a conscious plan for post-oil economy and to restructure the country and devolve power to units with the best practices of federalism? Is this plan that plan?” the ex-CBN boss asked.

He also described the envisaged 15 million jobs to be created under the plan as a “very nice wish.” “The plan envisages to continue the practice of the past government of borrowing to finance recurrent expenditure. Up until 2018, recurrent expenditure will continue to exceed total revenue. The deficit will continue to exceed capital budget, meaning that capital expenditure will continue to be borrowed, as done by the last government. So, what has changed?” he queried.

But in his remark, Oshiomhole fired back at the former CBN boss, accusing him of wrongly allocating millions of dollars to two new generation banks shortly before the naira was devalued. In Oshiomhole's word:

“I got some intelligence from my comrades who worked in the system and we found out that the CBN under Soludo had just allocated couple of millions of dollars to two, as they were then known, new generation banks. “And I asked Prof (Soludo), if you were going to devalue by Friday, why did you auction dollar at a lower rate on Thursday? I accused Soludo, I said you have enriched these two young men to the tune of N8bn, courtesy of your internal abuse.

“When the regulator behaved in this manner, then the Nigerian condition is much more serious than we can appreciate it. We need to deal with issues of attitude.”