NADDC urges collaboration to boost automotive sector

The Director-General of the National Automotive Design and Development Council, Joseph Osanipin, has called for collaboration among key players in the automotive industry to enable the achievement of smooth manufacturing of Nigeria-made vehicles.

The NADDC DG said the industry was capable of employing millions of Nigerian youths if properly explored as the industry was as viable as oil in the country.

Osanipin stated that during a recent working visit to vehicle assemblers’ plants in Lagos.

During the tour, he underscored the importance of synergy in achieving growth in the industry.

“We need to work with other agencies; we need to work with other ministries and apply an inter-ministerial approach in creating a kind of desk for the stakeholders so that when there are challenges, they will be able to report immediately instead of moving from one agency to the other,” he noted.

Osanipin further highlighted the potential in the local auto industry, emphasising the importance of human capital development in revamping the industry.

He stated that it was interesting to note that a lot of the assemblers were already providing training programmes and bringing in trainers to train the Nigerian youth in the art of building vehicles as well as converting Premium Motor Spirit-powered vehicles to Compressed Natural Gas-powered vehicles.

“On CNG-powered vehicles, Nigerians are already embracing the new initiative and hopefully by the time more of it are on the road, a lot of investors would key into the conversation process.

“The core stakeholders are ready to embrace the initiative of migrating from SKD to CKD. And this has a lot of advantages, for example- it will generate more employment opportunities, contribute more to the economy and a higher percentage of local components,” he said.

“Overall, we now know that we have the capability, all we need is to do some things differently in developing the auto sector,” he stressed.

Captains in the automobile industry who met with the NADDC DG at their different factories hailed his efforts, and support of the Bola Tinubu-led Federal Government in moving the automotive sector of the economy forward.

Speaking at his plant, the Chief Executive Officer of Cedric Masters, Anselm Ilekuba, told journalists that the government was determined to ensure the industry transmutes from the Semi Knocked Down to Completely Knocked Down as well as the actualisation of the CNG initiative.

Ilekuba also said that CNG was the new normal, thanking the President for an initiative well thought out.

His words, “We must thank Mr President for his great initiative. We are lucky to witness this new development. CNG is good for Nigeria and we are fortunate to be among the first to take advantage of this clear opportunity.

“For CNG, I have been trained in Texas and with some of the expatriates, who joined us. We have started transferring that knowledge to our people because it is one of the core areas where employment and new businesses will spring up.”