The Federal Govern-ment has reinstated its determination to bring down the increasing price of cement in spite of the recent desperate moves by a cartel to frustrate its efforts.
A top government official told LEADERSHIP last night that “the move is in the interest of the common citizens.”
Recently, the government, through the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, selected five companies � Minaj, BUA, Madewell, Lababibi and Regan � to import the cement in 50kg bags with the sole purpose of flooding the market and consequently reducing the cost of the product and, through this, democratise home ownership in the country.
However, LEADERSHIP gathered that some monopolists, led by the Chairman/Managing Director of the Flour Mill Limited, Mr. George Coumantarous, is working assiduously to frustrate the efforts of the government.
“It is interesting to note the hysteria trailing the decision of the Federal Government to bring down the prices of cement,” a stakeholder who doesn’t want his name mentioned in print for fear of backlash from
Coumantarous told our correspondent last night.
“The sole purpose of the government is to reduce the cost of the product and, through this, democratise home ownership in Nigeria; this is the first time a government in Nigeria has been motivated by the courage of its conviction and stand by the citizens of the country with a determination to relieve them of their misery, which has been forced on them by a few businessmen.
“The groups have formed themselves into a cartel that had monopolised essential products in the country, and in their greed they have being exploiting the honest Nigerian workers to fund their insatiable pleasure and love for private jets and the latest state of the art yachts and automobiles. The products are cement, salt, flour, sugar and oil.”
LEADERSHIP gathered that although Mr. Coumantarous, who has been in the country for nearly two decades, is the chief executive officer of a flour mill, he is hugely involved in the present monopoly of cement in the country for selfish business interest. Most stakeholders who spoke to our correspondent expressed serious concern over a false sense of exclusivity that all successive governments in the nation would be doing their biddings.
“The questionable actions of this cartel had depressed investment in the sub-sector for a long time, especially during the thieving regime of former President Olusegun Obasanjo; they used their political clout, generated by their financial contributions to sustain their greed,” an insider in the operational activities of the cement cartel said.
“It is now awakening and they should see the handwriting on the wall that we now have a thinking, listening and sensitive government, which is determined to do the right things in the general interest of the common citizens.
“Unlike the days of Obasanjo, cronyism has no place with Yar’Adua.
“The days of monopoly are over as President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua is ready to open the economic space and allow for the introduction of new ideas and ways of moving the economy forward,” our source added.
Wondering why it took the “bold step” by Yar’Adua to ensure availability of cement at reasonable price in the country before the cartel started indicating how it could use its magic wand to provide cement at cheaper prices, our source said what the monopolists are doing is inimical to the nation, especially the “long-suffering Nigerians.”
LEADERSHIP investigations revealed that at a time a 50kg bag of cement is being sold in the country for N2, 000 the same product costs N600 in a neighbouring country, Benin Republic, while the same product sells for N612 in Lebanon. In Cairo, it is $5, Greece $5.50 and Syria $7.
While the cartel may have continued to make huge issues out of the Federal Government’s moves to crash the price of cement, a stakeholder said, “It is unfair to the economy of the nation and the general welfare of its citizens for the cartel, which never had a single investment in the cement industries until about three years ago and had been receiving licences, tax and duty port concessions to import cement, including bags, for about 20 years to now insist on having a cement factory as a pre-condition for the issuance of licence in the current dispensation.
“There is also no moral justification for this group of people to preside over who is and who is not given the import license as they will not be fair in their selection. The law of self-preservation would naturally make them to try to preserve their exclusive club.”