ABUJA- The Ongoing efforts at building the economy through the Public Private Partnership (PPP) should not be used to steal public funds, Prof. Ibrahim Gambari said Gambari, a former UN Secretary General’s Special Envoy, said governments and the businesses involved must be honest in the drive to promote development.

He said at the Northern Nigeria Economic and Investment Summit in Abuja , that all efforts at promoting development must be “people centered and people driven”. He said the discovery of oil in the 70’s distorted the work ethic in the country, prompting many to seek easy ways of acquiring wealth.

Gambari said poverty in the North would only be tackled through self employment and creation of employment by businesses.

“Diversification should be a strategic national objective, not just a Northern agenda. “Thus, the Northern states desire to diversify from their dependence on oil- based revenue allocation and should be undertaken not as act of defiance or spite to any part
of the country.

“Instead, diversification should be viewed as a conscious effort by the Northern states to increase their contribution to the national wealth, ” he said. Gambari said the diversification that the Northern states should seek must be focused on reducing the national dependence on oil.

“It should take us beyond producing primary commodities, ” he added. He said the North produced groundnuts; the West, cocoa; the South South and South East produced palm oil in the past for export. “Those days are gone. Nigeria cannot reproduce that past and it should not.
Nigeria will not achieve international economic competitiveness through more dependence on primary commodities, ” he said. Gambari said the North must export processed agricultural products, to remain relevant.

He said the sectoral composition of the Nigerian economy showed that services agriculture, 23 percent and industries, 15 percent of the GDP.

“Oil accounts for over 30 percent of GDP,but it provides over 80 percent of government revenue and 90 percent of exports, ‘’ he said.

He said the high dependence on oil must be reversed for a more robust and diversified economy, with emphasis on agriculture.