The Make Edo Great Again (MEGA) agenda of the Obaseki-led administration should be the inextricable obligation of our contemporary times, William Otabor, an International Economist with vast professional background in finance, urges Edo People.
“The people of Edo State must seize the historic opportunity as well as boldly embrace the favorable tide of times consequent on having a governor with the combined capacity of an accomplished technocrat and a progressive political visionary at the helm of her affairs at such critical spring years of the 21 Century‘’, so declared an International Economic Development Expert, William Otabor, during a special global Zoom interactive session with a select group of journalists in Benin City over the weekend.
According to the International Economist with vast professional background in finance and global development strategies, ‘’Governor Obaseki can be described as the propitious catalyst vital at such lugubrious season in the economic history of a geopolitical entity like Edo State and across the country for uprooting the polity from a precarious situation of hopeless stagnation to a condition of vibrancy, buoyancy and ultimate global competitiveness.
“The governor has exhibited an exceptional brilliance of sterling leadership endowed with uncommon political and technocratic capacity during His Excellency’s appearance at the United Nations House, Abuja last week where he unambiguously mapped the contours of Edo State’s journey into a global economic league by 2050.’’
William Otabor further noted that some of the key economic engines highlighted by the governor at the United Nations event for acceleration of the attainment of the international Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) hold the most beneficial potentials to engender a rapid evolvement in Edo State’s economy .
In the words of William Otabor, ‘’it seems that Governor Obaseki is dexterously structuring a unique fusion of the Singaporean Lee Kuan Yew Development model fortified with an enviable dosage of Edo State’s wholesome domestically–designed economic paradigms.”
He underscored the point that one of the sensibly effective channels towards the prosperity of any society is to adopt the best applicable aspects of the policies which made other human habitations exceptionally and economically successful.
In expressing confidence regarding the feasibility and actualization of Governor Obaseki’s unprecedented Economic Blueprint, William Otabor, remarked that his intimate research and studies of phenomenal societal changes engendered by effective visionary policies has convinced him (Otabor) that African States are not destined and doomed to fall and fail.
‘’If Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew was able to uplift Singapore from the miasma of a penurious underdeveloped economy to the Olympian club of global economic power within a single generation, then Governor Obaseki with his enviable professional background, progressiveness, discipline and focus can equally be the architect of a 21st Century globally recognized economic powerhouse right here in the heart of Africa’’, William Otabor projected.
Further invoking the historical home front as inspiration for the internationally contextualized Obaseki’s economic philosophy, William Otabor recalled that the Ogbe Stadium in its glorious days had acquired a reputation as a global hub for sports under the leadership of Late. General (Dr.) Ogbemudia.
‘’If General Ogbemudia took us so admirably far in sports, it is perhaps now the providential obligation of Governor Obaseki to take us further and farther into the global arena of economic accomplishment and competiveness’’, the international financial expert posited.
‘’All the key engines for the economic uplift in Edo State seem to be diligently aligned for activation‘’, William Otabor observed, listing various areas of policies, initiatives and strategic infrastructures such as roads, power, education and housing as basic but crucial determinant of the civilizational status of any society.
He noted that the Governor has equally taken significant strides in other catalytic areas of economic endeavors with the prospective beneficial outcome of attraction of investments to the power and energy, Information and Communication Technology as well as agricultural processing industrial sectors of the economy.
‘’These thoughtful foundational initiatives by the Governor can provide the aeronautic-like fuel for the relocation and redefinition of Edo State economy in the crucial years of the 21st Century’’, William Otabor noted.
On some specific suggestions, William Otabor said that the commendable achievement of the Governor in the area of road infrastructure could simultaneously stimulate growth in the real estate sector. With greater access to more new areas opened up with the roads, new constructions, new housing communities and whole new towns could actually be developed through Public-Private–Partnership.
The Government, he noted should explore the creation of a vibrant secondary mortgage market employing the U.S model of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. The Financial Economist stated that such an arrangement will stimulate the enthusiastic participation of reputable financial institutions in the State’s real estate market.
On the imperatives of increased internal revenue generation, the economic development expert commended Governor Obaseki’s policy of ensuring that the tax base of the state is widened, ‘’thus ensuring that the tax burden is not hanging on the necks of a few people‘’, William Otabor observed.
He further noted that contemporaneously with the Governor’s tax reforms which has created greater efficiency in revenue collections, consideration should be given to more widespread electronic payment system of revenue remittance especially from public markets.
William Otabor, also remarked that the instruments of sales tax and licensing fees should be given consideration by the government as a way of further tapping into a viable revenue generation source.
He observed that some of the policies being initiated by the Governor could engender the expansion of the state’s formal economy with a pathway to establishing Edo State as the center for finance and business in Africa.
William Otabor, concluded his appearance at the media forum with the appeal that the participation and co-operation of the citizenry is crucial to the galvanization of the historic grand vision laid out by the governor both at the United Nations Forum and in the Make Edo Great Again (MEGA) strategic document.
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