Chuks Okocha and Kunle Aderinokun
19 June 2009
Abuja — The Federal Government has said that it has renewed its plan to borrow $500 million (about N75 billion) from the international capital market, months after jettisoning the plan.
But opposition parties have kicked against the latest $1 billion facility approved for Nigeria by the World Bank under International Develop-ment Assistance (IDA) conditions.
The $500 million bond is expected to be denominated in the Nigerian currency, naira, and was originally meant to finance part of the budget deficit for 2009 but was initially shelved because of the global financial crisis.
The renewed bid was made known yesterday when a delegation of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) led by its Chairman and Managing Director, Mr. Jiang Jianqing, met with some members of Federal Government's Economic Team as part of their quest for investment opportunity in the country.
They were accompanied by the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Stanbic IBTC Bank Plc, Mr. Chris Newson.
The Federal Government team included the Minister of Finance, Dr. Mansur Muhtar; Chief Economic Adviser to the President, Mallam Tanimu Yakubu Kurfi; Minister of Power, Mr. Lanre Babalola; and his deputy, Mr. Nuhu Wya.
The government urged the Chinese government and her private sector institutions to take the advantage created by the European nations to advance their investments into Nigeria, where there are liberal foreign exchange and remittance regulations.
Kurfi noted that Nigeria needed the $500 million to enable the Federal Government finance its budgetary deficit for the fiscal year 2009, caused by the dwindling fortune of oil revenue, a fall-out of the global financial crisis.
Babalola spoke of the great investment potentials abound in the power sector, while assuring them of his ministry's readiness to assist them in their quest to invest in the sector.
Jainqing said they embarked on the Africa investment tour to increase their investment and trade relations with Africa in general and Nigeria in particular.
The country's rich and population potentials, he pointed out, gave them the impetus to venture into such.
Meanwhile, opposition parties under the aegis of the Conference of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP) yesterday called on President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua not to take Nigeria back to debt by borrowing $1 billion from the World Bank Fund meant for Low Income Countries Under Stress (LICUS).
The opposition political parties said the loan was unnecessary in view of the rise in the price of crude oil to over $70 per barrel.
According to a statement signed by the National Publicity Secretary of CNPP, Osita Okechukwu, "Loans no matter how concessionary should be avoided; we must learn how to manage the abundant resources God bestowed on Nigerians, for he who goes aborrowing goes asorrowing."
CNPP said most Nigerians have no confidence in the fiscal discipline and project implementation of the Yar'Adua-led government, taking into cognizance the "orchestra of deception" and the fact that as far as the administration is concerned the war against corruption is dead on arrival.
It queried: "How can one explain that in spite of the oil windfall, the gulf between the rich and poor in Nigeria is daily widening and all the heart rendering probe conducted in the power, oil, banking, agriculture and other sectors have been swept under the carpet? It is our considered view that Nigeria has enough revenue to judiciously fund her infrastructure and social services without borrowing."
It said with oil price at $70 per barrel, the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Customs duty, recovery of billions of dollars, and Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) are enough sources of revenue to fund government development projects.
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Prersident Yar'Adua continues to pile up debt fr the country to UNDO OR REVERSE ALL THE GOOD THINGS PRESIDENT OBASANJO DID FOR THE COUNTRY. MOST OF THE LOANS WILL LIKELY END UP IN PRIVATE ACCOUNTS OF THE POLITICIANS.
WE WILL GIVE $5 ($5,000,000,000.00) BILLION WITHIN 14 DAYS NON REPAYABLE HUMANITARIAN PURPOSE. FOR THIS GUARANTEE TONY