THE Creative Industry Financing Initiative, CIFI, of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, has in collaboration with the Bankers’ Committee been working to improve access to long-term low-cost financing to entrepreneurs and investors in the Nigerian Creative and Information Technology sub-sector. Being part of efforts to boost job creation in Nigeria, especially among the youths, it is both timely and a step in the right direction.

ONE of the long-identified reasons our annual budgets are unable to improve our capital development at both the Federal and states levels over the years is inadequate funding. The annual budgets allocate roughly 70 per cent to recurrent expenditures while capital needs take about 30 per cent, most of which are not faithfully funded.

We note, with cautious delight, the general improvements in the anti-graft war of the Muhammadu Buhari administration, especially at this outset of his second term. There has been a general scaling-down of the blame game and greater inclusion in the anti-graft war as opposed to the perceived one-sidedness it was accused of during the highly politicised atmosphere of the first tenure.

President Muhammadu Buhari is known for his special regard for infrastructure development. From his days as the Executive Chairman of the defunct Petroleum Trust Fund, PTF, under the regime of the late General Sani Abacha, to his current one as Nigeria’s elected President, this much has been obvious, in spite of lean resources.

The prevalence of poverty in the land has led to the deterioration of the noble value systems which various Nigerians groups proudly upheld in the past. Where, for instance, our value system emphasised that human beings (especially children) were more valuable than money or material things, criminals now “sell” babies or steal (kidnap) people for money or ransom.