Nigeria’s sovereign debt stock, as at September 30 rose to an all-time ₦38.005 trillion or $92.626 billion, the Debt Management Office (DMO) has disclosed.
Africa Today News, New York understands that the debt comprises total external and domestic loans of the Federal Government, 36 states and the FCT.
According to the release from the DMO, the increase of ₦2.54 trillion when compared to the corresponding figure of ₦35.465 trillion at the end of Q2 2021 was largely accounted for by the $4 billion Eurobonds issued by the government in September 2021.
‘The issuance of the $4 billion Eurobonds has brought significant benefits to the economy by increasing the level of Nigeria’s external reserves, thereby supporting the Naira exchange rate and providing necessary capital to enable the Federal Government finance various projects in the budget.
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‘The triple tranche $4 billion Eurobond, issued in September 2021, was for the implementation of the new external borrowing of $6.18 billion in the 2021 Appropriation Act’, it explained.
However, the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs Zainab Ahmed, has severally insisted that Nigeria does not have a debt problem.
According to her, what the government needed to do was to increase its revenue generating capacity in order to boost revenue to about 50 percent of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
‘Nigeria does not have a debt problem. What we have is a revenue problem.
‘Our revenue to GDP is still one of the lowest among countries that are comparable to us. It’s about 19 percent of GDP and what the World Bank and IMF recommended is about 50 percent of GDP for countries that are our size. We are not there yet. What we have is a revenue problem’, she posited at a recent summit.
Africa Today News, New York reports that several economic watchers have continued to insist that Nigeria is gradually walking into a debt trap.
AFRICA TODAY NEWS, NEW YORK