Nigeria’s Debt Management Office (DMO) on Monday announced that the nation’s external debt profile as at March 2014 was US$9.16 billion with domestic debt pegged at 8.7 trillion naira (US$1=N163).
The Director General of Debt Management Office, Dr Abraham Nwankwo, told a committee of the on-going national conference that a breakdown of the external debt showed that the 36 States of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory Administration were responsible for 32 per cent or US$2.8billion of the debt while the Nigerian Federal government borrowed US$6.3 billion or 68 per cent of the total debt stock.
On the local debt, the bulk is owed by the Federal Government while the 36 States of the federation owed less than 20%.
Dr Nwankwo informed the committee that the local debt did not include the local contractors’ debt. He added that any foreign institution which gave a loan to any State government without approval of National Assembly should be ready to lose its money.
The Chairman of the conference committee, Alhaji Adamu Aliero, a former State Governor, said States must not be discouraged from borrowing so that they would be able to render desired service to the people.
