Our Government Will Keep Borrowing – Finance Minister

The federal government has once again defended its loan strategies despite the N6.258 trillion and has confidently stated that all loans are of feasible limits.

Miss Ahmed supported the federal borrowings, saying it had been in existence before and that the total borrowing was 23 per cent of the GDP as of July, Recall that the federal executive council recently approved another N16.39 trillion loan.

The minister of finance  Zainab Shamsuna Ahmed stated that “if we just depend on the revenues that we get, even though our revenues have increased,” the operational expenditure of the government, including salaries and other overheads, “is barely covered or swallowed up by the revenue.

She stated that Nigeria has been borrowing before the Buhari’s regime and this government is borrowing for economic development and will provide long term benefits to the Nigerian economy.

Notably olusegun obasenjo as well as sanusi lamido amongst other notable Nigerians have all expressed their displeasure of the federal governments loan strategy.

A report by the Nigerian Domestic and Foreign Debt Report, published this year by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), estimated that the country’s total public debt as of September 2020 was N32.2 trillion ($84.57 billion).

“As of July 2021, the total borrowing is 23 per cent of GDP. When you compare our borrowing to other countries, we’re the lowest within the region, lowest compared to Egypt, South Africa, Brazil, Mexico, the very lowest, and Angola,” she argued.

The president sent a fresh round of requests to the National Assembly, seeking permission to borrow another $4 billion loan.