President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday urged the Ministry of Finance Incorporated (MOFI) to grow its Assets Under Management from the current value of N18 trillion to at least N100 trillion by 2033.
President Buhari gave the charge at the launch of the new MOFI and inauguration of the governing council and board of directors of the body shortly before the commencement of the Federal Executive Council meeting at the council chambers of the State House, Abuja.
He said although MOFI existed before Nigeria’s independence in 1960, it was not structured to be governed or well-resourced to deliver on the expected mandate.
However, he added, MOFI’s peers that were deliberately set up with an institutional framework, governance structure, and execution capacity had made significant social and economic impacts in their respective nations, many of which had become global brands for investing domestically and internationally.
The President said his regime launched the reform of MOFI to transform it from a registry of investment records to becoming a World-Class Asset and Investment Management Company.
The launch came 117 days before the end of President Buhari administration on 29 May 2023.
He said MoFI would optimise the return on Federal Government’s investments by ensuring that they provide risk-adjusted returns sustainably, mobilizing capital and invest same in opportunities that are strategic to the nation’s social and economic development plan; and partner with the Federal Government to leverage the nation’s investments and assets to support the Federal Government in delivering on its social and economic mandate.
To this effect, Buhari directed the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs Zainab Ahmed to commence the process of amending the MOFI Act and other legislations to institutionalize the reform further.
In her remarks, Ahmed thanked the President for his support and approvals that had aided the restructuring and repositioning of MOFI possible.
She assured him that council members and the board would ensure that the new MOFI delivered on its mandates.
Chairman of the Board and former Finance Minister, Shamsudeen Usman, lamented that the extent of the FG’s investment was unknown.
According to him, some government-owned shares were in companies that had since gone under.
Usman said: “Therefore, the board’s inaugural meeting will focus on identifying the non-performing asset and turning them around.
“The first of all is that we will do a detailed inventory of these assets to produce a credible National Register of these assets. I can’t tell you some of them for now.
“But I think really the more important point is; there is nobody in government today that can tell you what assets are owned by the government with 100 percent certainty. Unfortunately, we are in that situation; some work has started. That’s why we arrived at this estimate of N18 trillion to N19 trillion.
“However, there are some that are even not known. There’s a lot of uncertainty. Where are they? What’s their value? And how can we turn them around”?
