Speaking on NTA on Wednesday, Mohammed said, yes, “we are in a recession and it is inevitable,” likening Nigeria to the likes of Spain, Mexico, Russia who he said “have all fallen into recession”. The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has confirmed that Nigeria has entered into recession.
His assertion after the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) reports that the country is in its worst recession in 36 years.
The
official data showed that the country’s gross domestic product
contracted for the second consecutive quarter since the recession of
2016, the worst since 1987 when GDP declined by 10.8 per cent.
Mohammed said that the recession is “is easy to understand” blaming “low demand for oil” which was caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
His statement reads : “It is true we are in a recession. Recession comes when a country records two consecutive quarters of negative growths. But we must go beyond that to understand that despite that, our economy is still very well in circumstances.
“The main reason why we have entered into this recession is the oil sector. The oil sector recorded -13.89% and that is the worst in 14 quarters. Of course, it is easy to understand why; with the pandemic, there is low demand for oil…but when you look at the non-oil sector which is about -2.51 % in Q3, it is far better than what it was in the Q2.
“Overall, yes, we are in a recession and it is inevitable but while our Q2 result was -6.1%, South Africa was -50% and as we speak today, Finland, Hungary, Spain, Mexico, Russia, Romania, Belgium, Austria have all fallen into recession.
“But
we are very confident that with the intervention policies, with the
fiscal and monetary interventions the government has put in place, the
recession will be short-lived.” he said
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