Commissioner Wants Igbo Businessmen To Return Home

The Enugu State Commissioner for Commerce and Industry, Dr Jude Akubuilo, on Thursday, called on businessmen and women of Igbo extraction in the Diaspora to invest more in the region.
Akubuilo made the appeal in Enugu when he inaugurated a 36-man Central Planning Committee for the hosting of the 2013 South East Economic Summit in October.
According to him, the peculiar history of the South-East of Nigeria in terms of enterprise made it imperative that its children must “think home’’ when sitting their businesses.
He said that Nigerians from the other geo-political zones hardly set up their businesses in states not related to their native origin.
“The governments of the five South-East states in Nigeria have teamed up in a new spirit of goodwill to provide an enabling environment for businesses in the zone.
“I am appealing to South Easterners in business outside the country, and in other geo-political zones within Nigeria, to adopt the think home philosophy,’’ he said.
Earlier, the Chairman of the committee, Chief Chris Obiefuna, said that efforts to leverage on the positive results in the past to grow the zone’s economy were paramount.
Obiefuna also said the conference would help the zone’s governments to prepare their medium and long term economic development agenda.
“These development agenda will be integrated into the proposed South East– South South Development Plan.
“And the implementation of the proposed regional merger will position the economy of the two zones to lead activities in the West and Central African sub-regions within the next 10 years.
“This conference will also ascertain the reasons why businesses in areas like Onitsha, Aba and Nnewi are relocating to Lagos.
“We want to proffer solutions that will arrest the situation and restore the South East to its past glories in business and economic activities,” he said.
He said that more support was required from the governors of the five South Eastern states to attain phenomenal successes from the conference held before the 2013 edition.