A Financial expert on Wednesday hailed the Central Bank Nigerian’s Monetary Policy Ratio (MPR) which retained the lending rate at 14 per cent and the Cash Reserve requirement (CRR) at 22.5 per cent.
Prof. Akpan Ekpo, Director-General, West African Institute for Financial And Economic Management (WAIFEM), Central Bank of Nigeria Learning Centre, made the commendation in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja.
The CBN rose from its first Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting in the 2017 fiscal year with a unanimous decision to retain the MPR and other monetary policy parameters.
Citing inflationary pressures, the CBN said that the committee was “reluctant’’ now to lower the MPR, but added that it would not hesitate to do so when it became expedient.
The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr Godwin Emefiele, said the decision was reached after the committee members considered the economic outlook of Africa’s largest economy.
Ekpo said the economy was in a recession, noting that only fiscal policy could be effective.
He said the government must spend on capital projects and recurrent that was mostly for state governments to get the economy out of the recession and restore growth.
Ekpo said a quick passage of the 2017 Budget would go a long way to address most of the issues.
FNO/IA