By William Jimoh

United Nations Industrial Development Organisation, UNIDO, representative to Nigeria and ECOWAS, Dr. Patrick Kormawa, has appealed to the Federal Government to create stronger economic institutions in a bid to enhance its programmes of rescuing the Nigerian economy from impending crisis.

Kormawa, who stated this at the fourth edition of Ikeja manufacturers consultative forum in Lagos, noted that the instability in planning, as well as in government policies in the country has adversely affected the development of many government institutions which efficiency could have developed the country’s economy to an enviable level.

According to him, “When there are strong institutions in place, then individuals will become master of the law, which will result in doing the right thing at the right time.

“If there is no strong financial institution for instance, we cannot achieve much in the financial sector and that applies to every other aspect of the economy.”

Continuing, Kormawa noted that there is need for long term planning and stability in polices made by the government and its institutions if the country must attain its visions and aspirations. “Continuity in projects is very essential to development; if there is change in government and the institutions are strong enough, there will not be a stop to any public project, but this is not the same with Nigeria and that is why the country is still behind maximising its economic potentials.

Developed economies like Japan, United State of America and Italy are able to develop there economy because of strong impact of their institutions. It is institutions that are moving these countries but the same cannot be said of Nigeria where rather than building the institutions, they are been weakened on regular basis.”

Supporting the gesture by the UNIDO boss, one of the manufactures, Mr. John Ikenobi, said the present conditions of dinging business in the country is making a lot of local manufacturers to operate at a very high production cost, which has resulted in the inability of home made products to compete with the foreign goods.

“We run our companies with generators all day long; there is problem of infrastructures, among other challenges that have brought about increase in our cost of production.