PRESIDENT BUHARI DISAGREES WITH CFTA: I WONT ALLOW NIGERIA TO BE A DUMPING GROUND

President Muhammadu Buhari yesterday said his administration will not be in a hurry to enter into any agreement that would make the country a dumping ground and jeopadise the security of the nation.

In respect to this, the President has set up a committee to review the Continental Free Trade Area (CTFA) framework agreement, which was signed in Kigali, Rwanda yesterday by some African countries.

The president’s declaration came as 44 African countries agreed to form a $3 trillion continental free-trade zone encompassing 1.2 billion people, even as the continent’s tow biggest economies, Nigeria and South Africa, were among countries that withheld their consent.

The President of Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN), Dr. Frank Jacobs said at a media briefing yesterday that the agreement in its present form would put Nigeria’s manufacturing sector and the economy in general at a gross disadvantage against other countries.

During the briefing at Federal Executive Council (FEC)   meeting presided over by the President at Council chambers, presidential villa, Abuja, Special Adviser to the President on Media, Chief Femi Adesina, said it was expected that Minister of Labour would call for a stakeholder’s meeting with the Labour movement to brainstorm on the implications of the  CFTA framework agreement.

He also didn’t want anything that could encourage on the dumping of finished goods in Nigeria was going to be contrary to our interest and also the country is year to recover fully on, so this is the reason the president declined.