Former presidential spokesman Laolu Akande has urged Nigerian President Bola Tinubu to seek assistance outside his government in order to curb the rising inflation plaguing the country.
Akande, who served as media aide to former vice president Professor Yemi Osinbajo, stated this on Thursday while featuring as guest on Channels Television flagship programme, Sunrise Daily.
While admitting that the current challenges faced by the country didn’t start under the Tinubu-led administration, Akande said there are individuals outside the administration that have a better grasp of the situation the country is facing.
“The president is going to get the blame or the praise for what is happening. This is happening under his watch. Now, I can say, you know, because of what I experienced, that a lot of the problems that we are dealing with today, they have been on for a long time.
“There are people that understand the problem even more than the average guy. I think that the president should reach out wider. His party, the APC, has been in government for eight years. There are people that have been working on this problem for eight years.” he said.
Urging the president not to shy away from seeking the required assistance in tackling the problem, Akande said, “It’s important to benefit from their insight. Don’t forget what I said. It is he that we take the blame or the praise.”
Reacting to the ruling of the federal high court sitting in Lagos ordering the federal government to fix the prices of some basic goods and petroleum products within seven days, amid rapidly increasing prices of goods and services in the country, Akande opined that the government should do everything in its power to stem the tide of price inflation.
One lesson that we cannot remove from that court ruling, that the court is saying that, hey, you’ve got to deal with the issue of price inflation, you know, because government has the instruments to make, you know, to deliver that kind of good in terms of reasonable prices, welfare, even in terms of security, government has the resources to make it happen,” he said.
According to figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Nigeria’s inflation rate has climbed to approximately 30%, largely driven by the increasing cost of food.
