Ibrahim Shuaibu
1 July 2009
Kano — Senate Committee Chairman on Commerce, Senator Joel Danlami Ikenya, has declared that President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua's 7-Point Agenda revolves around adequate power generation and supply across the country.
The legislator spoke in Kano, where he recently led members of his committee as part of the Senate's oversight functions to supervise an expansion project of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC)'s office.
He said though all the 7-Point Agenda are important, but energy, which is inevitable to economic growth, should be given top priority.
Danlami explained that there must to be a radical approach towards ensuring 24 hours power generation and supply across the country, to meet the Agenda.
According to him, the 7-Point Agenda is all about education, good health, wealth creation, job generation, security, agriculture, "and when you have adequate power supply, you have achieved all these things."
He called on the presidency to marshal out a scale of preference, whereas power generation would be on the top list, adding that, "if the present effort being made by the presidency on power sees the light of the day, things will change for the better."
Ikenya also insisted that, if given the opportunity, he would reduce the 7-Point Agenda to one, arguing that, "it (agenda) is a heavy burden to carry," because according to him, all aspects of the economy require adequate funding.
"More resources should be allocated to power generation because after it, every other thing would take shape. It will revive the shut and ailing industries, which depend heavily on energy to run, and by extension, the creation of employment opportunities for our large army of unemployed youths."
According to him, "the 7-Point Agenda as it is today is not the problem but rather its implementation. If we can implement the agenda, irrespective of the call for its reduction to one, we can still meet our target by 2020."
Ikenya expressed delight over the ongoing global economic meltdown, stressing that it has given the country another opportunity to look inwards and evolve other alternatives for revenue generation.
He pointed out that without the meltdown government would have continued to rely solely on oil as the source of revenue generation for the country.
The situation, he noted, has compelled the government to start exiting to agriculture as a way out, which is a non-oil revenue base; adding that areas that were hitherto neglected are now receiving attention.
"Our focus is that we should make haste and diversify from oil because for a country to rely on one source of revenue will at the close of the day boomerang".
The senate committee chairman on commerce disclosed that to ensure adequate non oil revenue, the senate will spearhead the crusade to expand all the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) offices nationwide, which he noted would in turn generate more revenue for the country.
The committee chairman noted that his group will recommend to the CAC, through the ministry of commerce, that Kano should have more than one office, pointing out that Kano CAC generates about N20 million monthly, which he said is very encouraging.
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The fuel resources you export could do you more good used this way then they can by bringing in foreign money. You should also aggressively address your non-fossil resources: Tropical sunlight and the incredible biomass in that maddeningly renewable resource-Typha. Go slowly with coal. Coal is dirty to produce and use, and needs expensive cleansing afterward. Save it for metallurgy.