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The Chief Executive Officer, Financial Derivatives Company Limited, Bismarck Rewane, has predicted that the economic reforms and policies of President Bola Tinubu's administration will start yielding positive results from the first quarter of 2024.
Rewane said this while assuring Nigerians that the current administration is taking the right measures to redirect Nigeria on the path of economic prosperity.
However, the renowned economist warned that the hardship being experienced by Nigerians will get even worse as this year winds down to its close and the reforms take shape.
He made these known during an interview on ARISE Television programme on Saturday, July 22, 2023.
“The bad news is that there is pain and they will be more pain in the short run but the good news is that there will be gains in the first quarter of 2024,” Rewane said.
“I used to think that you will get that sooner, but you will need to have your supplementary budget and recycle money into the system.”
Nigerians have been enduring a torrid time since President Tinubu announced the end of the subsidy regime during his inauguration speech on May 29, 2023.
The declaration caused an instant increase in petrol pump prices which jumped from ₦189 to between ₦600-₦700.
The federal government via the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has also unified the exchange rate as part of the wider reforms in the nation's financial sector.
Commenting on this, Rewane said “The exchange rate is misaligned because there are certain things that are being done that affect it. For example, you are holding some variables constants while allowing some variables to change.”
“In reality, no variable should be constant. Any economist who says a variable is in constant is practising partial equilibrium analysis and it doesn’t work,” the financial analyst added.