Tobias Sylvester
Five years into the eight-year tenure of President Muhammadu Buhari, his administration is yet to deliver on key promises upon which Nigerians overwhelmingly voted him.
President Buhari, who is celebrating his first year of the second term and fifth year in office today (Friday), had on Thursday written to the National Assembly to approve a fresh external loan request of $5.513 billion.
The Senate during their plenary on Thursday justified the president’s loan request to finance 2020 budget, insisting that it would not be a burden to the country.
However, KanyiDaily recalls that the National Assembly had in April this year approved N850bn domestic loan request of the President, to finance projects in the 2020 budget.
The loan was to be sourced from external lending institutions, but the arrangement was frustrated due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Earlier in the year, the Senate had also approved another $22.79bn external loan request for Buhari, which was also meant to fund the total 2020 budget size of N10.5tn.
Surprisingly again on Thursday, May 28, 2020, Buhari sent another external loan request of $5.513bn to the two chambers of the federal parliament.
The Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, read the letters during plenary, after a closed session with members on Thursday.
Buhari said the loan would be used to finance the proposed 2020 revised budget, some priority projects and other projects to support state governments.
He said it became imperative for the funding of the revised 2020 budget and insulating the nation’s economy from the yet-to-be-abated COVID-19 pandemic.
The sources for the loans, according to him, are the International Monetary Fund, $3.4bn; World Bank, $1.4bn; Africa Development Bank, $500m; Islamic Development Bank, $113m, among others.
“As the Senate may be aware, the COViD-19 pandemic has resulted in economic and fiscal challenges for many countries,” the letter partly reads.
“Nigeria has also been affected in this regard, especially with the lower demand for crude oil, which has affected our sales and the sharp decline in the price of oil below $25 per barrel, which is much lower than the $57 per barrel benchmark in the 2020 Appropriation Act.
“The COVlD-19 pandemic has also created the need of additional expenditure in the health sector. All of these have necessitated a review of the 2020 Budget and the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (2020-2022).
“The draft revised budget proposed by the executive for 2020 has a higher deficit. In order to finance the deficit, the Federal Government is planning to raise funds from both domestic and external sources.
“For the external component, the government is negotiating with multilateral institutions for funding on concessionary terms. The facilities totalling $5.513bn, being arranged in this regard, are detailed below.”
Details of the projects were not made available to journalists, but both chambers of the National Assembly had referred the documents to their committees on local and foreign debts. The committees are expected to submit their reports on Tuesday next week.
