Babangida’s policies led to downfall of Naira – Buhari

– Is there any difference between General Muhammadu Buhari and President Muhammadu Buhari in terms of offering Nigeria and Nigerians with the best economic policies
– The blame for the present economic woes of the country has been put at the door step of Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida (IBB)
– Nigerians are groaning under a high exchange rate especially businessmen and importers
The analysis done by Buharimetre on how President Muhammadu Buhari has steered the ship of the nation is what the president himself may need to think so much about.
President Buhari was addressed as General Muhammadu Buhari at least 30 years ago until he was about to be sworn in on Friday, May 29, 2015. He himself dropped General from his name.

The interest in General Buhari as a military Head of State was that some of his economic policies were lauded by economic experts especially when he paid Nigeria’s foreign debts and stabilised the exchange rate as one Naira to a Dollar.
General Buhari ensured he never made the Naira slip as he left office without devaluing Nigeria’s currency. However, as a democratically elected president, Buhari is currently battling hard to ensure that the Naira is not exchange for more that N300 for a Dollar at the parallel market. The Naira has fallen against the Dollar several times since Buhari assumed office.
When General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida (rtd) took over the reins of leadership of the country from General Buhari, some public analysts then initially believe better days were ahead for the economy of the country not until IBB took Nigeria to the wrong direction by introducing the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) which was the brain-child of the Paris club led by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB).
As the Naira continues to fall against the Dollar, President Buhari further explained one of the reasons for this. In an interview the president granted on Friday, February 5 as reported in The Cable.
“President Muhammadu Buhari said the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) killed the naira. Ibrahim Babangida, former military president, instituted SAP between 1986 and 1988.
“Buhari traced the origin of the problem facing the Nigerian currency to the administration that succeeded his in the military era. Structural adjustment programmes (SAPs) consist of loans provided by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank (WB) to countries that experienced economic crises.”
The Minister of Finance then, Chief Olu Falae was the one that championed the SAP which Nigerians had to willingly and unwillingly accept.
The idea behind SAP was to first weaken the Naira against the Dollar and thereafter introduce different austerity measures in which the citizens especially the suffering masses bore the brunt.
After Babangida’s regime agreed to the terms of these capitalist institutions, they offered Nigeria loan.
When some economic experts realised that the loan was more of a economic bondage, they dissuaded Babangida from collecting the loan. Babangida went ahead to collect the loan and since then Nigeria’s economic fortunes started plummeting .
Babangida met the exchange rate at one Naira to a Dollar but left it as N22 to one Dollar after introducing the SAP and other unfavourable economic policies.