President Muhammadu Buhari has described as a welcome development the phenomenal improvement of Nigeria on the World Bank’s Doing Business latest rankings released on Tuesday.
Besides moving up 24 places in the rankings, Nigeria is also reported by the World Bank to be among the Top Ten Reformers globally.
The President, in a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina, in Abuja on Tuesday, congratulated all Nigerians on this very significant step forward.
According to him, this development symbolizes the real success achieved by the Presidential Enabling Business Environment Council, (PEBEC), the National Assembly and State Governments in making it easy for people to register their businesses, speedily.
He said that the development also made it easy for the people to obtain licenses and approvals from government agencies without unnecessary bureaucratic bottlenecks.
“It also reflects our efforts to make it easy for foreign business visitors to obtain visa on arrival, pass through our airports and do their businesses with ease and speed.”
President Buhari particularly commended PEDEC chaired by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, for a job well done.
He expressed optimism that the nation would continue to witness greater achievements in no distant future.
The World Bank, had on Tuesday, said that Nigeria now ranked 145th position out of 190 countries in the Ease of Doing Business index for 2018
The World Bank stated this in its just released Ease of Doing Business report titled, “Doing Business 2018: Reforming to create jobs”.
The report indicated that Nigeria had moved up by 24 points from 169th position on the 2017 ranking and also 170th position on the 2016 ranking to 145 in the World Bank’s 2018 report.
According to the World Bank, Nigeria alongside El Salvador, India, Malawi, Brunei Darussalam, Kosovo, Uzbekistan, Thailand, Zambia and Djibouti are the top 10 improved countries worldwide, after carrying out numerous reforms to improve their business environments.(NAN)