Nigeria among worst places to do business –LCCI

Director, Research and Advocacy of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Dr Vincent Nwani, has decried Nigeria’s hostile business environment, saying it is one of the worst in the world.

He said that businesses fail in the country because of the challenges of in security, infrastructure, stability of laws and policies.

Nwani who made the remarks in Lagos at a Breakfast Policy Dialogue by the Initiative for Public Policy Analysis, said the objective of any regulatory policy was in the public interest, adding that for products, such as tobacco, a fair balance has to be made in all areas involved in the public interest.

He regretted that despite the noise on the need to diversify the economy, not much has been done in the area of ease of doing business in the country, adding that Nigeria has enough regulations but lacks the will for implementation. Speaking on “Lawmaking and Execution in Nigeria: The roles of the private sector” ,a legal practitioner, Jiti Ogunye, stressed the need to imbibe a culture of self regulation in business. He said that the Organised Private Sector should get interested in the business of lawmaking in the country. “As individual units in the Organised Private Sector, we must take self regulation seriously” , he said. Mr Ogunye said that many policies in the country would never work until the whole laws for the regulation of the conduct of the people are reformed.

He also decried the level of corruption in the country, which he argued has affected even the business of lawmaking. Mr Ogunye lamented the insecurity of lives and property of the average Nigerian and cautioned that the issue needs to be consciously and urgently tackled.