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ECONOMIC POLICY REFORMS IN NIGERIA: ACHIEVEMENTS AND CHALLENGES
By

DR. K. S. ADEYEMI EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR UNION BANK OF NIGERIA PLC

ABSTRACT The paper examines the reform programmes embarked upon by different Administrations in Nigeria, starting from the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), which was launched in 1986 to the privatization and liberalization policy of the present regime.

The paper enumerates the achievements of the reform programmes and articulates the challenges associated with them. In addition, the author outlines the critical success factors for economic reforms and analyses the components of the reform programmes.

The paper observes that economic reforms were instituted in Nigeria to address the economic decline resulting from years of excessive regulation, noting that while the reforms have restored macroeconomic stability and resulted in moderate growth, unemployment and poverty remain high and widespread.

In addressing the challenges confronting the reform programmes, a number of recommendations were put forward. Prominent among these are the introduction of a national social security system to take care of the unemployed, the ploughing back of extra revenues from the removal of oil subsidy into developing social and economic infrastructure and the need to pay adequate attention to the provision of quality education at all levels to facilitate the production of skilled manpower.

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INTRODUCTION Ever since Keynes’ (1936) General Theory of Income, Employment, and Prices overturned the classical economists’ recommendation of minimal government intervention in economic activities, most countries have witnessed alternating cycles of economic planning (government’s deliberate control and co-ordination of economic activities) and liberalization, depending on the dominant political mood in the country concerned. However, most developing countries embraced development planning until the middle of the 1980s. In the four decades... [continues]

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