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By Fortune Eromosele, Abuja

Ahead of the 2023 general elections, an expert in economy, Executive Director, Initiative for Leadership and Economic Watch in Nigeria, ILEWN, Agbongbolor Splendour, has said Nigerians need leaders who are professionals in handling economic issues.

He stated this at the civil society roundtable engagement with the theme: “X-raying the National Lottery Trust Fund Mandate; vis-a-vis it’s Achievements, Challenges and Prospects for Nigeria Economic and Social Development,” organised by the New Era for Sustainable Leadership and Accountability initiative, in Abuja.

According to him, Nigeria is at a critical stage of electing leaders who would alleviate the issues bedevilling the country as well as needing experts in the economy.

He said, “The call for sound leadership that can take the nation from this point is very sacrosanct at this moment. You can see a lot of leadership failure. A lack of direction in terms of government policies are the things that affect leadership.

“When there’s no direction as to where we are going and what we are going to achieve within a certain framework and time at the end of the day we will just be pursuing the entire process without a concrete thing we can lay our hands on that in the next number of years we would have been able to achieve this aspect of the economy that would have strengthened other areas of the economy.

“For that particular reason it is very imperative at this moment that Nigerians need to look very well to be able to elect leaders that have the ability to manage the economy, we need an expert as the President of this country at the moment.”

Speaking in the same vein, Executive Director New Era for Sustainable Leadership and Accountability Initiative, Comrade Edwin Olorunfemi, lamented the pain Nigerians are currently passing through, saying that civil society organisations play major roles in helping policymakers ameliorate the burden peeving Nigerians.

“We feel the need to help the policymakers and MDAs to fulfil their mandates. We feel it is not good enough to leave it in the hands of managers. We as civil society practitioners feel we should be contributing to their mandates.

“As it is Nigerians are crying, things are not moving well as expected and it seems as if there’s no hope. But we feel the pain is too much and civil societies can come in to help ameliorate. We will invest any ideas that will help Nigerians out of these doldrums.

“And also it is not always about the leadership even the followers to have their own problems. Nigerians don’t want to pay but they want to enjoy, so we have attitudes that are anti-development, that we ourselves have to change. The change we are looking for is not a one-person thing, it is a collective effort, it begins from the roots, our homes and values,” he said.

On his part, Executive Director of the National Lottery Trust Fund, Bello Maigari, said, the Lottery Trust Fund remains an integral fragment in Nigeria’s quest for economic development.