Ben Akabueze, the Director-General of the Federation’s Budget Office, asserts that the IMF has miscalculated its forecasts for the Nigerian economy over the previous four years.
“The IMF has miscalculated our projections for the last four years,” Akabueze declared on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme on Wednesday. “Our actual growth has consistently exceeded their estimates.”
Akabueze discussed the government of President Bola Tinubu’s economic forecast for 2024.
The President gave the National Assembly (NASS) his first budget estimates for 2024, totaling N27.5 trillion, on November 29, 2023.
The President states that 3.76% economic growth is anticipated, and that “inflation is expected to moderate to 21.4 percent in 2024.”
The President had stated, “Budget deficit is projected at 18 trillion naira in 2024, or 3.88 percent of GDP (Gross Domestic Product (GDP)).”
The President’s forecast deviated from and was deemed “ambitious” in comparison to the IMF’s earlier October prediction. The Washington-based lender had predicted 3.1% GDP growth for the nation in 2024.
The head of the Budget Office said that the IMF “can’t get it right better than the people who have direct responsibility for managing their individual economies” and that the organization’s estimates “do not represent the holy grail on economic growth.”
The Tinubu administration’s first budget’s growth rate, according to Akabueze, “doesn’t even yet reflect the ambition of the government,” and the current administration “wants to double the GDP before the end of the first term.”
The National Assembly’s 2024 budget predictions, he claimed, were “way too small” for Nigeria’s needs, but the government had to reduce its coat to fit its clothes.
Notwithstanding the objections raised against the 2024 budget estimates, the director general of the Budget Office maintained that the appropriations law provides healthcare, security, education, and economic support for the underprivileged.
