Despite the financial crisis that is rocking the nation’s capital market, the house of representative last week threw out a motion calling on the federal government to intervene in the capital market.

The motion which was entitled “Urgent need for Federal Government’s intervention in the Nigerian Capital Market,” and sponsored by the chairman, House Committee on Capital Market, Honorable Ahmed Aliyu Wadada from Nasarawa State called on the federal government to intervene in the capital market crisis.

Wadada said it was no longer news that the capital market was in crisis and a lot of foreign investments had been withdrawn. He said that the figure of the withdrawal amounted to $200 billion.

He stressed that government sometimes relied on the capital market to secure funds for infrastructural development, noting that if the capital market was in trouble, it was an indication of a major crisis. Noting that there is a direct link between capital and money markets he urged his colleagues to rise to the occasion by supporting the motion.

Lanre Agoro from Oyo State believed that the intervention of government in the capital market would restore investors’ confidence in the market, recalling that when some organizations had public offer, many people bought shares and the values of those shares had depreciated.

In his own view, Ita Enang described investment in the capital market as gambling and added that instead of bailing out industry, the government should channel such resources to reviving manufacturing companies.

Mr. Dimeji Bankole, the Speaker of the house threw the question to the House and those who opposed the motion had their way through a voice vote.

Meanwhile, the London FTSE 100, which is major market indicator of the London Stock Exchange fell by 31 per cent last year, while the Dow Jones, regarded as the leading indicator for United States stock market, shed 34 per cent in 2008 while Frankfurt Dax-30, the market gauge used by German’s main market dipped by 40.4 per cent. What these jurisdictions have lost was lower than Nigeria’s 45.8 per cent lost in 2008.

While Nigerian government still believes that there is no need for any intervention European governments have embarked on direct interventions that are expected to help their market rebound.

The consensus of many stakeholders in the nation’s capital market is that if the government waited longer than now, there may not be any market to salvage again, as they expressed serious concerns about the continued deterioration of things on the stock exchange.