Mr Samuel Nzekwe, former President, Association of National Accountants of Nigerian (ANAN), has called for introduction of legislation that would control bank lending to politicians to finance election campaigns.
Nzekwe made the call on Saturday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos.
He saud that the legislation could curtail the lending not for productive activities.
The ex- ANAN president also said such unproductive activities could pose serious inflation,thereby prompting a development where many funds would be chasing fewer goods and services.
Nzekwe ssid that increased inflation level would not be good for an economy of an importing nation.
According to him, Nigeria has a cost-push inflation resulting from the wide exchange rate between the dollar and naira as the country is an importing nation.
The financial expert said there was need to curtail bank lending.to politicians in order not to worsen the existing cost-push inflation in the country.
Nzekwe said that the magnitude of the funds being injected by politicians into the system had the potential to impact either positively or negatively on an economy.
He, however, said there should be ways government, through the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), could curtail such influx of funds in circulation by politicians.
Nzekwe said, “Most politicians, after getting loans from banks, don’t keep their money in naira but in dollar.
“They believe price of dollar is stable, therefore easy to convert to naira and easily move around with it.
“There is need to introduce legislation on lending from banks to politicians in order to control the influx of funds in the society.”
He also said that government needed to always enforce its existing law on limit of funds that could be spent during the electioneering period.
According to him, some people are just naturally deviants saying that the law, a respecter of no anyone, should deal with them.
NAN reports that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has legal provisions on spending limit for campaigns in Nigeria.
The limit for presidential and governorship candidates is N1 billion and N200 million respectively.
Also, the Senate is N40 million, House of Representatives (N20 million) while an individual or a corporate body can only donate N1 million to a candidate’s campaign.
