Social Democratic Party (SDP) presidential candidate for the 2023 elections, Prince Adewole Adebayo, has attributed the country’s economic challenges to the policies of the Bola Tinubu administration.
In an interview with ChannelsTV, Adebayo criticized the Tinubu government for prioritizing money distribution over value creation.
The former presidential candidate emphasized that simply increasing the minimum wage would not solve the country’s problems.
He urged the Tinubu administration to develop and implement policies aimed at enhancing the value of the naira.
Adebayo expressed concern that the government’s focus on distributing money was detracting from efforts to boost the naira’s value through strategic policy initiatives.
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“What we are doing now is that we are organising our politics and governance around sharing money,” Adebayo said.
“So, in Abuja, the states come to share, the local governments under ALGON also come to share. TUC and NLC are also coming to collect their own share. It’s still the principle of sharing money not sharing value, not creating things.”
Adebayo said the current debate on the new minimum wage did not arise from the inadequacy of wages but from the problem of purchasing power.
“What is causing price instability is from the purchasing power of the naira and there are two ways to help the purchasing power of the naira. One is that you can do stabilisation of the currency itself so that you kill hyperinflation and inflation and the naira from January to December can maintain its purchasing power.
“Second thing you need to do is to come from the welfarism point of view. What are the things the workers worry about? What do they spend their money on?”
He highlighted that by offering affordable housing, transportation, healthcare, and education, the need for increasing the minimum wage would diminish.
Adebayo foresaw that even if the government managed to meet the demand for a N615,000 minimum wage, its value would depreciate within four years without addressing fundamental needs.
He emphasized that to tackle the economic challenges in the country, Tinubu must prioritize significant social investments.
