The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said on Tuesday that the FG through its Agriculture Empowerment Programme had created new set of millionaires.
The Minister said this on the “Sunrise Daily”, a Channels TV programme, giving the mid-term report of President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration.
Mohammed said that many young farmers were empowered through the Central Bank of Nigeria’s Anchor Borrower Programme and the Federal Ministry of Agriculture’s Soil Map initiative.
“When we came in, we inherited about N1.7 trillion in debt owed to contractors; 202 roads were abandoned. In the entire 2015, only N18 billion was spent on roads and N5 billion spent on power.
“In 2016/2017 we released N1.2 trillion for capital projects only; we spent N260 billion on roads and N99 billion on power generation.
“We have constructed 320 kilometres of roads and fixed 460 kilometres of road: We have built 24 bridges and repaired about 21
“On rail lines, we have commenced the construction of the 150 km per hour standard gauge from Lagos to Ibadan and working on others across the country.
“We are coming from a situation where we were earning over 100 dollar per barrel of oil and it was reduced to about 30 dollar per barrel.
“It takes acute discipline and management of resources to be where we are today.
“In spite of recession, between October last year and today, we have been able to add additional 7 billion dollars to our federal reserves.
“We have also successfully added 87 million dollar to the Excess Crude Account and attract 500 million dollar to the Sovereign Wealth Fund,” he said, as published on Daily Trust.
