Business

Nigeria’s debt hits N35.5tn, says DMO

Published

3 years ago

September 16, 2021

Nigeria’s total debt rose to N35.5 trillion at the end of June 2021, the Debt Management Office has said.

The new figure, it stated, was 7.75 per cent higher than the N32.9 trillion recorded at the close of last year.

Director-General of the DMO, Patience Oniha, said on Wednesday that the external debt accounted for N13.7 trillion or 38.7 per cent while approximately N21.8 trillion was sourced from the local market.

She explained that 83.07 per cent of the total debt was held by the Federal Government while the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory’s borrowings accounted for 16.93 per cent.

The percentage of the FG’s share of the national debt had increased from 81.94 per cent as at December 2020.

Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, had disclosed at a session organised by the African Development Bank that debts of some states were not captured in the figures regarded as national debts.

Oniha said the amount remained within fiscally accepted bound except that not much is done to shore up poor revenue.

She explained that China accounted for about 10 per cent of the external debt (which amounts to approximately N1.37 trillion), while the multilateral organisations had the largest share of 54.9 per cent.

Oniha, in a virtual media chat on Wednesday, said the country risked the debt sustainability issue if it failed to grow the current low revenue profile, which places Nigeria in the poorest category among its peers.

She said, “We should focus on revenue. The good thing about it is that the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning has started a programme aimed at growing the revenue profile.

“We must discipline ourselves to follow through to grow our revenue. If we continue to borrow and do nothing about growing our revenue base as other countries have done, we may have a debt sustainability challenge.”

Comparing the tax to gross domestic product of 11 countries, the DG said Nigeria as of 2019 was one the nations with the least ratio.

The selected countries are the United States, United Kingdom, Brazil, South Africa, Kenya and Mexico. Others included Canada, Morocco, Ghana and Angola.

While South Africa had the highest tax to GDP of 26.7 per cent, Nigeria sat at the bottom with 5.68 per cent. Angola, which came after Nigeria from the bottom, recorded 9.4 per cent tax to GDP.

Oniha said it was important to interrogate the reasons the country’s huge GDP has not translated to revenue, and that it was time the authorities aggressively pursued income-yielding policies.

She said Nigeria’s debt to GDP remained considerably low at 21.92 per cent, up from 21.61 per cent last year. She, however, said it could increase to 35 per cent when the ways and means facility (WMF), that is, overdrafts with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), is added to the debt stock.

On the current value of the WMF, the DG said she could only give information on the status at the beginning of the year, when it was estimated at N10 trillion, suggesting that the figure could be higher.

She admitted that the government had overreached the limit set by the CBN Act, stressing that the government was compelled to do so owing to the revenue shortfall.

“We are currently working at converting it to a tenor facility. This is because overdrafts should be cleared when they are due,” the DMO boss started.

Aviation

Disaster averted as bird strike hits Abuja-Lagos Air Peace flight

Published

8 hours ago

November 14, 2024

Trends Admin

Disaster averted as bird strike hits Abuja-Lagos Air Peace flight

An Abuja-Lagos flight was on Thursday aborted following a bird strike on the airplane belonging to Air Peace, forcing the authorities to ground the aircraft.

The bird strike experienced in the early hours reportedly prompted a ramp return to ensure the safety of passengers onboard.

All the passengers quickly disembarked and were calmed down before they were moved into another plane for the one-hour journey.

A bird strike is a collision between a bird and an aircraft, or other airborne animal, while the aircraft is in flight, taking off, or landing. And it can be a significant threat to aircraft safety.

Air Peace in a statement by its Head of Corporate Communications, Ejike Ndiulo, said the bird strike occurred at 6:30am, and all passengers disembarked normally.

The statement read, “We wish to inform our esteemed passengers that our Abuja- Lagos 06:30 flight experienced a bird strike before take-off, prompting a ramp return as a safety measure. All passengers disembarked normally.

“We have deployed a replacement aircraft for the affected flight in order to minimize disruptions, thus ensuring that passengers continue their journeys promptly.

“We appeal for the understanding of our valued passengers impacted by this development, as well as those on other flights that may experience delays.

“At Air Peace, we are committed to providing safe, comfortable, and reliable air travel for all our passengers.”

Business

NNPC achieves 1.8mbpd crude oil production

Published

8 hours ago

November 14, 2024

Trends Admin

NNPC achieves 1.8mbpd crude oil production

The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd) and its partners have revved up crude oil and gas production to 1.8million barrels per day (mbpd) and 7.4standard cubic feet per day (scfd).

The company which announced this at a press briefing said the feat was achieved in compliance with the mandate of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

Speaking on the development, the Group Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Mele Kyari, congratulated the Production War Room Team that anchored the production recovery process.

“The team has done a great job in driving this project of not just production recovery but also escalating production to expected levels that are in the short and long terms acceptable to our shareholders based on the mandates that we
have from the President, the Honourable Minister, and the Board,” Kyari explained.

Giving details of the efforts of the Production War Room, the Chief War Room Coordinator and Senior Business Adviser to the Group Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Lawal Musa, disclosed that the feat was achieved through the collaborative efforts of Joint Venture and Production Sharing Contract partners, the Office of the National Security Adviser, as well as government and private security agencies.

NNPC achieves 1.8mbpd crude oil production

Business

FG gets fresh $134m loan from AfDB for agric projects

Published

9 hours ago

November 14, 2024

Trends Admin

FG gets fresh $134m loan from AfDB for agric projects

The Federal Government has secured a loan facility of $134million from the African Development Bank (AfDB) to help farmers boost seeds and grain production in the country.

This is contained in a statement issued by Anthonia Eremah, Chief Information Officer, Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security, on Thursday, in Abuja.

Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Sen. Abubakar Kyari, made his know at the unveiling of the 2024/2025 National Dry Season Farming in Calabar, Cross River State capital.

Kyari explained that with the re-introduction of the national dry season farming to boost year-round agricultural production, the loan would be handy and guarantee national food security in the country.

The minister said the initiative is under the National Agricultural Growth Support Scheme-Agro Pocket (NAGS-AP) Project.

He said the federal government had declared an emergency on food production to enable all Nigerians to get easy access to quality and nutritional food at affordable rates.

Kyari also said government wants to use the agricultural sector for national economic revival through increase in production of some staple food crops such as wheat, rice, maize, sorghum, soybean, and cassava during both dry and wet season farming.

He added that 107,429 wheat farmers were supported under phase 1 of the 2023/2024 dry season, and 43,997 rice farmers under the second phase of the 2023/2024 dry season.