ROTIMI ASHER
The Federal Government of Nigeria is on the verge of making it a policy for government ministries, agencies, states, and local governments to patronize made in Nigeria vehicles.
The Director-General, National Automotive Design and Development Council(NADDC), Mr. Jelani Aliyu made this known during his address at the just concluded Lagos Motor Fair.
He said, ‘’ the Federal government is aware of the challenges that the auto companies are going through after investing well over 500 billion with an installed capacity of 400,000 in your factories, plants and operations,’’ adding that, ‘’ it is a huge commitment to the industry and the future of Nigeria.’’
“We are not there yet as a result of the challenges of the market. That is why it is crucial and very important to continue to drive market demand’’
According to him, the Nigerian government is working towards driving market demand.
“As you are aware,” he explained, “there are two executive orders to push for the patronage of made in Nigeria vehicles. There is renewed commitment to ensure that those two executive orders are strictly enforced.
‘’ We are working hard to see that it is a policy, not just the agencies of government but states and local government to patronize made in Nigeria vehicles. We believe that when that happens, there will be more demands and we will also continue to encourage organizations and private citizens to patronize vehicles made in Nigeria.’’
On infrastructure, he said, ‘’ NADDC is building six automotive centers, one in each geo-political zone, southeast in Abakaliki, southwest in Osogbo, South-South in Benin, North Central Lokoja, North East, Bauchi, North West, Zamfara.’’
‘’ Those are centralized locations for which toward the end of March, the Federal Executive Council approved the purchase of equipment and facilities to which ten or thousands of Nigeria will be empowered and trained in the auto-related field so that we can add significant value to your operations, training, manufacturing and aftersales.
‘’Also, to ensure the issue of spare parts is taken care of, we have built automotive testing facilities at the Ikorodu area of Lagos. We are just waiting for the supply. We hope they will install and get the testing facilities going. We have another one in Zaria, another one in Enugu. By the end of this year, all the testing facilities will be ready. Any vehicle imported or made in Nigeria must be certified by these centers.
NADDC is a parastatal of the Federal Ministry of trade and investment established to recommend and supervise policies and programmes for locally manufactured vehicles and components.
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