Femi Falana, a human rights lawyer, has urged the Nigerian government to abandon the “deleterious policies” of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), such as asking the government to raise electricity tariffs and eliminate whatever remained of the petrol subsidy, despite the country’s unfavourable political climate.
“There is no society in the world where government does not subsidise one product or the other even in the most advanced capitalist societies. And that is why Nigerians must begin to ask the government to discard and jettison the deleterious programmes and policies of the IMF and the World Bank,” Falana on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme on Tuesday.
“The only economic body recognised by the constitution to advise the President is the National Economic Council headed by the Vice President and peopled by the state governors, Governor of the Central Bank and the Minister of Finance.”
He lamented that the government has abdicated its responsibility to the IMF and the World Bank, claiming the Bretton Woods bodies were set up by imperialists.
“It is an ideological battles; these institutions were set up by imperialism principally to destroy the economies of developing nations while they turn their eyes when the other governments are giving subsidies to their people.
“The economies of the United Kingdom, the United States, Germany and other are not collapsing despite that they give subsidies,” he said.
The senior lawyer noted that he would take steps after the expiration of the deadline set up by the courts for government to set up prices of commodities.