ABUJA — A senior South-East policy voice has called for the creation of a South-East Common Market, urging the five states in the region to move from political rhetoric to coordinated economic execution under a long-term Vision 2050 framework.
Speaking at a regional development forum, the speaker argued that the South-East can no longer operate as “five individual islands” and must instead function as a single economic bloc capable of attracting investment, scaling businesses, and competing in an increasingly integrated global economy.
He said current global shifts — from technology disruption and climate stress to supply-chain realignment and fast-moving capital — now reward regions that can organize infrastructure, align regulations, and coordinate at scale. Regions that fail to integrate, he warned, risk being trapped as “consumers of other people’s added value.”
In his remarks, he also praised President Bola Tinubu’s reform posture and support for territorially inclusive development, saying strengthened regional development commissions provide critical policy space for long-range planning in the South-East.
At the center of the address was a practical execution agenda built around four immediate priorities.
First, he called for a jointly funded and jointly governed regional project-preparation phase to develop bankable cross-state investments and answer hard questions on sequencing, financing, and delivery.
Second, he proposed interstate logistics integration — including road, rail, inland hubs, and multimodal transport — describing connectivity as the backbone of market unification rather than a “prestige project.”
Third, he said security must be treated as shared regional infrastructure, with cross-state intelligence-sharing, interoperable communications, and a centralized response architecture to prevent criminals from moving between jurisdictions.
Fourth, he urged harmonization of investment processes, regulations, and dispute-resolution systems to create predictability for businesses and investors.
The speech framed fragmentation as the region’s core economic risk: a condition where talent remains high but scale is low, businesses grow but cannot expand efficiently, and young people emigrate because local systems fail to support ambition. The long-term danger, he said, is “quiet stagnation through fragmentation.”
He emphasized that Vision 2050 is not meant to replace state authority but to solve problems no single state can solve alone. Differences among the five states, he said, should be organized, not erased.
Closing the session, he called for measurable commitments before delegates leave the forum, warning that history will judge the region not by the quality of its speeches but by the discipline of post-forum execution.
