Make Nnewi full manufacturing hub, Moghalu advises FG

A former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, and presidential candidate of the Young Progressive Party, YPP, Prof. Kingsley Moghalu, has called on the federal government to make Nnewi a full manufacturing hub in Nigeria to serve as a panacea for the chase for foreign investment.

Moghalu, who made the call weekend during the Nnewi 2020 Investment Summit, said Nnewi is the only industrial town in the whole world that is growing without the support of government. A huge manufacturing hub that was started from the scratch by indigenes of the town and has continued to grow without the support of the government.

According to him, Nnewi would hardly become a successful manufacturing hub based on the efforts of the private sector alone hence the need for the federal government to provide the necessary amenities to make businesses thrive in the area.

Muoghalu who was the lead speaker at the event lamented that the federal and state governments in Nigeria are always on the move, looking for foreign investments, when it could support a huge manufacturing hub like Nnewi to reach its limit and in turn help in growing the nation’s economy.

“It will not be out of place to say that the federal government has abandoned Nnewi. Do you know what people in Nnewi will do if what government did at the Lekki Free Trade Zone is done here?

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Muoghalu also tasked the Nnewi business community to show maximum interest in politics. He contended that politics influences public policy, and that when the right kind of people are in  political offices with ideas that can drive business and manufacturing, then, businesses would not face as many problems as they were facing presently in Nigeria.

Mr. Kelechi Nwosu, the CEO of TBWA, a leading marketing company and co-sponsors of the event in his welcome address said that the summit is an inaugural event put together to rub minds on ways to scale up growth in Nnewi.

Earlier, the member representing Nnewi North, Nnewi South and Ekwusigo Constituency at the national assembly, Hon. Chris Emeka Azubogu, said the dream of the greater Nnewi industrial hub could be achieved when government provide needed infrastructure to drive manufacturing and also reshape policies that would help drive industries.

According to him, “Government has to work hard to ensure that the policy on energising the economy works in Nnewi. Again, Nnewi business community has to generate power locally; I mean independent power source. When we get reliable, affordable and sustainable energy and support it with what we are getting from the national grid, it will stimulate both economic and industrial growth.”