 Let me say that it's a very special honour to be at the closing of this inaugural Gombe State Investment Summit. I bring you the very warm greetings of His Excellency, President Mohamedu Buhari, on the success of this inaugural summit. I'd like to especially thank my brother and friend, Governor Mohamedu Inuaiaia and the government and people of Gombe State for the very warm reception that is always given to me and members of my team at all times that have visited Gombe State and today also at this very successful event. I salute your Excellency's focus on and your determination to improve the fortunes of Gombe State, especially by positioning it for investments from both foreign and local investors. I'd also like to thank all of our guests from the private sector and investment community. Your presence and participation has contributed significantly to the success of this summit. This inaugural summit Go Invest is consistent with Gombe State's mission to create an enabling environment for sustainable prosperity, peace, cohesion and an all-inclusive development for the people of this state. As contained in the development agenda for Gombe State, the DEVA GOM 2021-2030. The development plan itself is perhaps one of the very few by a sub-national to articulate a detailed long-term vision and a plan towards the transformation of the state. In addition, the state developed a full medium-term expenditure framework covering the last two years, 2020-2022. So DEVA GOM 2021-2030 is both a visioning exercise and a concrete roadmap to the long-term growth and sustainable development of Gombe State. I'm delighted that we are beginning to harvest the first fruits of the plan. One of those is the remarkable feat of attaining the first position in the sub-national ease of doing business baseline survey report of 2021. I'm also informed that Gombe State was recently invited by the world-renowned Royal Institute of International Affairs, popularly known as Chatham House, to share its experience in implementing the state's health system reforms. These validations from different bodies, local and international, could not have come by accident. They are a product of the very strong leadership and commitment that has been demonstrated by Your Excellency. And I think this became even clearer when, even as a governor-elect in 2019, Your Excellency commissioned, as you've noted, a needs assessment survey, a vital step towards developing a solid roadmap of reforms and programs for the progress that we see today. You will recall that just barely 18 months ago or so, I was here in Gombe for the 27th edition of the MSME clinics, where I visited the inspiring ground nut oil and the ground nut oil as well as the processing hub for ground nut oil and rice and hundreds of bags of rice that we saw on that occasion. And these are being produced daily in this state. Today, we can confidently say that Gombe is taking its investment drive to the next level with this survey. The business environment is critical to the prosperity of our great country, and I want to repeat that. The business environment, and I think the Honorable Minister of Communications and Digital Economy captured the context very well, that the business environment, what we do, what we are able to do for the private sector is critical for the prosperity of our great country. This has become even more critical as we have an incredible opportunity with the African Continental Free Trade Agreement. That free trade agreement stands to impact the Nigerian economy in several ways. The objectives of the agreement, or one of the objectives of the agreement fundamentally aligns with the National Development Plan and of course also with the plan that has just been laid out by Gombe State. In boosting the competitiveness of Nigeria's exports, the trade agreement serves as a solid platform for cooperation on infrastructure development, on investment, on technology transfer and on innovation. So there is a clear impetus for all branches and levels of the Nigerian government, as well as the private sector, to deliver concrete, ambitious and critical policy interventions in order to take full advantage of the opportunities for the economy and by extension the entire continent. That is why in the past six years, the federal government has aggressively pursued under the Presidential Enabling Business Council initiatives the creation of an environment that allows Nigerian businesses at every level to operate without the bottlenecks and drawbacks that have come to characterise their interface with agencies and regulators. And I'm glad that Gombe State is at the centre of the business enabling reforms which we have, which informs your standing as the number one state in the sub-national ease of doing business survey report ranking. And now as captured by the responses from the private sector in that report, Gombe leads the frontier in infrastructure and security indicators, as well as in the skills and labour indicator. The state has also ranked second in the regulatory environment indicator. Among the implemented reforms which led to that result includes the waiver on business premises registration for all new businesses, the downward review of right-of-way charges from 1,500 Naira to 145 Naira. Businesses also reported that registering property can be completed in about seven days here in Gombe State. Gombe State also provides incentives such as free allocation of land to new businesses with investments of at least a hundred million. So where a business is investing up to a hundred million, the state is able to offer concessional land grants. Such businesses are also able to enjoy waivers on annual ground rent at the initial stages of the establishment. These reforms are being completed against the background of a stable security situation in the state and investments in critical infrastructure and human development. But perhaps in my own view the most poignant affirmation of the belief of Gombe State in the notion that government must catalyze economic growth with both policy measures and brick-and-mortar is the commencement in 2021 of the 1,000 hectare Muhammad-e-Buhari industrial park, which we are now told that the first phase of it is ready, over 369 hectares of that is ready. This is to be a purpose-built, fully resourced manufacturing and industrial processing hub designed to accommodate 10 mega factories. The project is important for the value-added functions of the factories and their accretion to both internal and national revenue and the jobs that it will create. Ten thousand direct jobs were told and a hundred thousand indirect jobs. I continue to follow the progress of the Gombe State health insurance scheme as well, which was launched only a few months before the MSME clinics and has now enrolled a hundred thousand residents, including over 40,000 poor and vulnerable under the Go-Health scheme. These investments in human capital development alongside physical infrastructure development are the strong foundations for the rapid development led by small and medium enterprises. And this aligns with the vision of the state to be the industrial hub of the northeast of our country. I think it's fascinating that Governor Yahya has approached the development of the state by thinking like a sovereign, as opposed to thinking like a sub-national. This explains why he took the trouble. This explains why he took the trouble to draw up a 10-year development plan and MTF and takes the issues of creating and enabling business environment seriously. And this is as it should be. Gombe would rank, could rank very easily as a sovereign state. His GDP is almost, Gombe's GDP today is almost three times the GDP of Nambia and it's almost at the same level as the GDP of Liberia. So when you compare this state to actual sovereign states, you can see very clearly that the only way to plan the growth of this state is to plan it as you would plan the growth of the country. And I'm very happy that Governor Yahya is doing exactly that. As a progressive government, we remain committed to the policies and reform efforts that are geared towards economic diversification and improved productivity. We're proud of the giant strides that Gombe State has recorded so far, but more importantly we are confident of the successful results of the programs currently being implemented by the state government and those that are underway in the areas of health, industrialization and agriculture. We must remain, we must all remain committed and focused, especially towards the economic diversification and improved productivity of our country. So we're proud of the giant strides that Gombe State has recorded so far, and we hope that all of what we will be seeing in the next few years will be even more poignant and even much better than what we are seeing today. It is also evident to some of us that this state is poised for greater things in the next few years, and from what we see being currently being implemented by the state government, it is clear that what we will see in another couple of years will be much, much better than what we have seen in the past year. Gombe has become a reference point for business climate reforms, and I think this encourages the existing potential investors, local and foreign, to embrace the opportunities that are available in the state. Let me once again thank the business community, private sector and international investors for standing up to the current challenges of doing business today, and these are global challenges, they are local challenges, but I must commend you for standing up to those challenges. The future of our country rests in the hands of business owners, in the hands of entrepreneurs and all over the state, all over the country. The successes that we have seen here in Gombe State is substantially on account of the effective collaboration of the private sector, the state government and the federal government. Our federation benefits our people when states and federal authorities alongside private actors think and work together. So let me again re-emphasize, let me again re-emphasize the federal government's pledge to work with the Gombe State government to give you all the support that you need in order to ensure that your businesses and the business environment succeeds. God bless Gombe State, God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria.