Speaking at the World Youth Gathering, Holy Ghost Adoration Ground, Uke in Idemili North Local Government Area of Anambra State, Ubah lamented, stating that there was nothing wrong with the Nigerian economy. Rather, he pointed out the country's lack of good economic managers as being responsible for the current economic plight.
Recall that last February, Ubah had vowed on national television that if consulted by President Buhari, he could use his technical know-how to stabilize the Naira to an exchange rate of N200=$1.
At the time, the Dollar/Naira disparity had skyrocketed that N400 was already exchanging for $1 in the Parallel market.
Insisting on his earlier stance of possessing the technical expertise on how the Dollar/Naira disparity can be crashed, Dr. Ubah pointed that "the only solution to Nigeria's economic problems is one - addressing the cancer that has persistently eaten up our Forex. According to him, the cancer responsible for the proliferating Dollar/Naira disparity can be eliminated if 10 modular refineries are set up. "The second cancer that is affecting us is the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC)." Ubah stated.
The oil magnate stated at the Adoration Ground in Uke, "I said that I am going to bring down the dollars, I sought for consultations because in the past I have done so many things and at the end of the day, people took the glory. This is an issue that is very important to me. The Government must understand this. Bill Gates, one of the richest men in the World today said, 'it's not about academics, it's about being streetwise."
"Money-making is an art. There is nobody that can't make money. It depends on how you design the art of making money. Now, let me give you an example today and let me also proffer a solution to Nigeria's economic problems.
"The biggest Forex consumer in Nigeria today is the Petroleum Product Downstream sector, of which I am the leader. Petroleum products take over 75 per cent of the Forex that Nigeria generates. Therefore, if you want to attack the difference between the Naira and the Dollar, which no expert has been able to find a solution, what you need to do is to find an alternative, so that the demand for Forex needed for the importation of petroleum products will crash.
"If you do that, you have taken away 75 percent of that cancer that is taking away our dollars. And how do you do this? There's what is called top-up refineries. Some top-up refineries can cost us as little as $200million.
"If I am the Chief Economist of this country, and I want to bring back the value of Naira and bring life back to the economy of Nigeria, what I need to do is to take up a $2 billion bond from our reserve. If I am able to take a bond of $2billion from our reserve, which is not money I am spending, but a bond, our money remains. I can take this $2billion and then share it among 10 companies. In those 10 companies, I will create Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) of 10 oil marketers to one company.
"If you bring 10 oil marketers to run one company and Government funds them for 10 years, it means that all of us will go there and we will bring the best of us to manage the company.
"Therefore, what we are going to do is create 10 companies along the whole water lines of Nigeria, and in six months time, we can now refine our crude oil here in Nigeria, instead of taking it abroad to refine. By so doing, we don't need to buy dollars anymore to import petroleum products. It means that we can now be refining our crude oil, using it to meet our own petroleum needs.
"Petroleum product is one of the biggest factor today in th
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