Factors hampering ease-of-doing business vacated, Tinubu assures Saudi businesses

President Bola Tinubu, yesterday, declared that the red tape blocking ease of doing business in Nigeria has been permanently vacated, assuring Saudi Arabian investors of the best returns on their investment in Africa’s largest economy.

President Tinubu gave the assurance in Riyadh, the capital of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, during a deliberation with the captains of industry in the Kingdom, at the Nigeria-Saudi Investment Roundtable, where he also declared that Nigeria is “open for business.”

According to a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, the President told the Roundtable that with his team in place, every negative perception or notion about what Nigeria had represented in the past, with respect to the ease of doing business, monetary policy, and trade cooperation, was no longer applicable now and in the future of the country.

“I believe in this team that I have brought from Nigeria. When I took office, I declared the immediate commencement of bold and fundamental economic reforms. We have executed them, and we sustain the reform process. Today, I declare that red tape is gone!

“I believe in the full application of free market economics. Your money will flow easily in and easily out. The arbitrage around our nation’s old foreign exchange policy regime and the corruption that was associated with it is also gone!

“We took on those bold endeavours from day one in preparation for serious investors like you seated here. The greatest opportunity for any entity to prosper lies in its human capital. My team is prepared. We can produce. Our market is full of Nigerian youths who are brilliant, highly educated, industrious, and passionate about innovation and engagement with world-class services.

“The navigation of the ship of this great nation lies in the membership seated here. We are ready to answer all of your questions directly, even into this night if need be. The sky is not just the limit, but it is the destination for our two countries and peoples,” the Nigerian President confidently affirmed.

Saudi Arabia’s Trade and Investment Minister, Kahlid El-Falih, noted the passion and candid expression of the Nigerian leader, saying that after listening to the President speak from his heart without any written remarks about what is possible between the two nations, Nigerians can expect that the Saudi investment community will respond not in words alone, but with substantial new investment across several sectors of the Nigerian economy.

“The Minister of Commerce and I will be visiting Nigeria either before the end of this year or very early next year with a very large delegation of Saudi CEOs from all key sectors. We know you are ready for business, so we do not want to come to Nigeria for any exploratory discussion. We are coming for implementation. It is an action visit.”