New Independence Group (NIG) has tasked governments at all levels in Nigeria to pursue people-oriented goals in the coming year.

The group, a socio-economic think tank, also urged the citizens to remain vigilant and ensure that governance serves their best interest.

The pieces of advice were contained in a New Year Day felicitation issued by the group in a press statement, signed by its Convener, Professor Akinyemi Onigbinde.

“We join all Nigerians in celebrating the successful exhaustion of the year 2016 as they no doubt survived the throes of unprecedented economic crisis, insecurity, and exacerbated rot that characterised the spent epoch,” the NIG declared.

It noted that the challenges were “the corollary of wrong leadership choices and decisions,” but added that “the people survived by a special  grace.”

The group continued: “As the year 2017 beckons, we ask Nigerians not to relent in their characteristic resilience and moral resistance to non- beneficial policy options. We must always remember that eternal vigilance is required for good governance to be realised.”

The NIG stated further: “It is our hope that Nigerians would have been afforded the learning curve towards adapting to the new realities, and ensure that no opportunity for achieving their quest for upward mobility is left unexplored.”

It added: “The NIG is not unaware of how government policies, blueprints and budgetary decisions are key to unleashing the opportunities requisite to mitigating the harsh economic conditions that the people have endured.

“We however call on government at all tiers to be more responsive to the people. We ask that this time, budgets should not just be about empty 'buzzphrasing' and the bureaucratic rituals that only empower a few  cronies of elements in power, but conceptualized in manner that can afford the extrication of most from the backwaters.”