Lagos State is 5th largest economy in Africa

Lagos State has emerged as the fifth largest economy in Africa, consequent upon which, Governor Akinwunmi Ambode, disclosed that his administration is in the process of setting up an Economic Management Team, EMT, comprising distinguished individuals from the private sector and the public sector to manage and improve the feat.

Ambode spoke on Tuesday at the Lagos House in Ikeja when he received a delegation from the Nigerian-British Chamber of Commerce on courtesy visit, disclosing that the emergence of Lagos as Africa’s fifth largest economy was very instructive.

He promised that his government would explore synergy with the private sector with the view to catapult the State into a true global city-state in the true sense of the word.

Ambode said: “Very soon we would be setting up what we would refer to as an Economic Management Team to drive the fifth largest economy, because that’s the way we need to envision ourself and this Economic Management Team will involve nominees from the Chambers and other people in the private sector so that we can collaborate because majorly this economy is driven by the private sector.

“Our duty is to create an enabling environment and fuse all that together.

“I think that synergy can just catapult Lagos into that global city-state that we want it to be.”

The governor explained that his decision to come up with the Office of Oversees Affairs and Investment, otherwise known as Lagos Global, was part of efforts at encouraging investment in Lagos both from within and outside, among many other initiatives of the present administration.

His words: “I think it is very instructive to clearly state that the economy of Lagos is in the hands of the private sector and beyond the fact that Lagos is now the fifth largest economy in Africa, the drive to take Nigeria out of recession actually resides in the private sector and willingness on the part of the public sector.

“Because our economy is in the hands of the private sector and we are willing to allow them drive it, that is why we have decided to formulate policies and decisions that will make the private sector to thrive in this State and that is why in the last 18 months, we have been running this administration on a tripod of security, job opportunities and infrastructure development.”

Explaining the tripod, Ambode said his administration believed that when the people and investors are well secured, businesses will thrive and more people would be employed, while the resources generated in terms of Internally Generated Revenue, IGR, would be deployed to provide infrastructure for the people.

The International Monetary Fund, IMF, had, in its Economic Outlook Report for October, projected Nigeria as the biggest economy in Africa ahead of South Africa and Egypt, with the Accountant-General of the Federation, Alhaji Idris Ahmed saying that the development demonstrates the resilience of the economy.