Recession In Nigeria Will Be Shortlived – Lai Mohammed

The Minister of Information and Technology, Lai Mohammed, has said that the necessary policies, fical and monetary interventions to lift Nigeria out of recesion have been put in place.

Lai Mohammed said this during an interview on NTA where he spoke about the recession Nigeria is currently in.

He said that the recession was caused by the global crash in oil prices and the coronavirus pandemic.

“It is true we are in a recession. Recession comes when a country records two consecutive quarters of negative growths. But we must go beyond that to understand that despite that, our economy is still very well in circumstances.

“The main reason why we have entered into this recession is the oil sector. The oil sector recorded -13.89% and that is the worst in 14 quarters. Of course, it is easy to understand why; with the pandemic, there is low demand for oil…but when you look at the non-oil sector which is about -2.51 % in Q3, it is far better than what it was in the Q2.

“Overall, yes, we are in a recession and it is inevitable but while our Q2 result was -6.1%, South Africa was -50% and as we speak today, Finland, Hungary, Spain, Mexico, Russia, Romania, Belgium, Austria have all fallen into recession.

“But we are very confident that with the intervention policies, with the fiscal and monetary interventions the government has put in place, the recession will be short-lived,” he said