Dangote waiver: Nigeria is rigged in favour of the well-connected ― Atedo Peterside

President and founder of Anap Foundation, says the Nigerian economy is rigged in favour of a handful of well-connected people.

Peterside was reacting to news that the federal government has granted Dangote Cement a waiver to export cement through the closed land borders.

“Allowing legitimate exporters & importers to move their goods across the border should be a no-brainer,” the founder of Stanbic IBTC Bank, wrote in a tweet.

“Why refuse everybody else & allow only one company (Dangote)? This is why some of us argue that the Nigerian economy is rigged in favour of a handful of well-connected persons.”

On Monday, managing director of Dangote Cement, Michel Puchercos, told an investor on Monday that the company has resumed cement export to Niger and Togo in a controlled measure following a waiver from the federal government.

Nigeria’s land borders have remained permanently closed since 2019.

He first ordered the border with the Benin Republic closed in August and then extended it to all land borders in October of the same year.

It was ostensibly to prevent rice smuggling into the country and smuggling of petroleum products into those neighbouring countries.

The closure, which is meant to boost local production and strengthen security, has taken a significant toll on neighbouring countries such as Togo, Ghana, and Cote D’Ivoire that rely on Nigeria’s market of over 200 million people.

Nigerian businesses have also not been able to export their products through the land borders as a result of the closure.

Since then, however, household spending on food items has more than doubled across the country with food inflation rising to 16.6 per cent in October 2020.

A bag of rice which was around ₦16,000 in August 2019 is now sold for as high as N32,000.

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