Minister of Finance, Kemi
Adeosun and Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, Godwin Emefiele, on
Sunday explained why they were not in attendance during an investment meeting
organized by the Nigerian Embassy in Washington, United States.
The Emir of Kano, Sanusi
Lamido Sanusi, had decried absence of Nigerian officials at the event, which
held on the side-lines of the 2018 World Bank/IMF Spring Meetings.
Speaking to journalists at
a joint briefing, Adeosun said: “I attended the IMFC which is the highest
decision making body of the IMF and I represent 23 African countries in that
role. So one of the things I have to do is to issue a statement on behalf of those
23 which includes most of the anglophone countries – South Africa and
Mozambique.
“There has been some
controversy over the scheduling I wasn’t due at any event. I was there as a
governor of the IMF and member of IMFC to represent the 23 African countries
and that schedule is what I must adhere to. I think maybe there was some
scheduling challenges there.”
In his own reaction,
Emiefiele said: “The Minister of Finance has taken time to say why we are here.
We are here to attend the statutory meetings. The Minister of Finance and me
being the governor of the CBN; what takes preeminence is the meetings in the
IMF as well as the meetings at the World Bank.
“I think it is important
for me to say this: when I arrived in Washington, the officials of the embassy
spoke with me that there was going to be a US Nigeria summit and I said I will
check my schedule because I wasn’t consulted when this summit was being
organized
“What one would have
expected is that they would have checked my schedule and that of the Finance
Minister if they thought that our presence at the summit was very necessary.
“They could have checked
our schedule to see that there was no conflict. I sit here to say the
US-Nigeria Summit was meant to hold between 2pm and 3pm (on Saturday) whereas
the World Bank committed plenary session which is an assembly of ministers and
governors of Central Banks was to hold between 2.45 and 5pm.
“There was no way the
Minister of Finance and myself could have been at those meetings. But I think
it is important to say it is unfair for people to begin to cast aspersions
without understanding our schedules. The main reason we are here is because of
the statutory meetings of the IMF and world Bank.
“I felt I should explain
this. We are not irresponsible people and please we apologise to those
investors who had gathered at the Nigerian Embassy for the summit…my apologies.
“But I know we also held
some side meetings with some investors and there will always be lots of
opportunities to meet with them. But I want to say this is not the fault of the
Minister of Finance and myself, the CBN Governor”.Dailypost
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