Dangote Sinotruk Begs FG To Intervene In Forex Crisis

Management of Dangote Sinotruk West Africa Limited, a joint venture between Dangote Industries and Sino Truck of China has urged the Federal Government to quickly intervene to stop the growing exchange rate.
The company made the plea on Wednesday at the ongoing 22nd edition of Abuja International Auto Fair while lamenting that the exchange rate is adversely affecting its operations in the assemblage of high-end trucks in Nigeria.
Speaking to journalists at the Exhibition Pavilion, the venue of the fair, Mr Adeola Adeokun, the company’s Deputy Manager, Sales and Marketing, decried the country’s forex crisis lamenting that the exchange rate has recorded a 35% increase within a short period.
Adeokun said that there is a need for government to intervene to check the high forex rate in order to save local production of goods including vehicles.
According to him, the development is giving an undue advantage to companies importing fully built vehicles while making things difficult for those that create jobs.
“As today there are economic challenges all over and we are part of the global market. This event is part of what provides the opportunity for us to showcase our products and from what we are seeing now, we can say the patronage is very low this shows that we need to rejig the economy. But a lot of our trucks are on the road, and people are buying but we still need to do more.
“Most particularly, we need the government to intervene in the area of Foreign Exchange or Forex, because now, we assemble, we manufacture, before now, forex was at 10% but now they have raised it to 35%. And don’t forget that we are competing with other companies bringing in the same type of products, so it is cheaper for those that bring in the products from outside. And because we assemble we create jobs, we have so many staff, we pay overheads. So in a nutshell, the government need to make the forex more accessible and available to us being the manufacturers” he said.
Meanwhile earlier the NADDC DG, Jelani Aliyu said the auto industry remained crucial to the development of the nation’s economy, adding the agency was on course with the NAIDP as a tool to transform the industry, despite its implementation challenges.