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Enugu State governor-elect, Peter Mbah has pledged that his administration will grow the economy of Enugu State from $4.4 billion to at least $30bn within the next eight years.
Mbah, who made this vow while speaking with reporters in Lagos on Thursday, stressed that his government will also disrupt the current revenue model in the state to be able to achieve the massive and unprecedented development of the state in accordance with the promises made to the people during his campaign.
The governor-elect also pointed out that his administration will unlock Enugu rural economy.
He said, ‘We want to have an integrated rural development. We will grow the economy from $4.4billion to $30billion within the next eight years.
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‘During our campaign we told Enugu people that we will achieve a zero percent rate in our poverty head count index. We are saying that by 2031 there will be zero poverty in Enugu. There will be eradication, not reduction of poverty, meaning that we are no longer going to have people under extreme or abject poverty, or living below the poverty line. We are also unique in our strategic objective.
‘It is not just having this massive vision, growing the economy and lifting people out of poverty but another thing is the strategy, to be able to explain to them how you are going to do it.
He added, ‘We are not going by the pattern of growth that they had in the past, which is how we started talking about disrupting the current revenue model, which obviously focuses on receipt of revenue from Abuja. Going to Abuja at the end of each month to get money from the federation account and coming to Enugu to spend, and that money won’t optimally be able to intervene across the critical sector of our economy. We had to explain to them how we intend to disrupt, that statuesque, how we intend to deploy a disruptive innovation, deploy critical alternative financing so that we begin to generate funds.
‘We know that if we want to go to the rate that we have proposed, the growth will not come from the public sector. It has to come from constructive investment from the private sector.
‘Private sector is going to play a critical role and that means business. Businesses are not ‘Father Christmas’, they want returns on their investments. If you want to engage them, you need to explain to them how you intend to de-risk their investments,’ Mbah said.
