By James Itodo
President Bola Tinubu has sought the approval of the Senate for the 2023-2024 external borrowing plan of 8.6 billion dollars and 100 million euros.
This is contained in a letter addressed to President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio and read during plenary in Abuja.
President Tinubu in the letter said the request for borrowings were earlier contained in the 2022 to 2024 External borrowing plans approved by the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari at the Federal Executive Council on May 15th.
Tinubu said it has become imperative that the Federal Government resort to prudent external borrowing to breach the financial gap.
He said the fund would be used to execute key infrastructure projects including
Power, railway, health among others.
According to him, the projects cut across all sectors with specific emphasis on Infrastructure, agriculture, health, education, water supply, security, employment generation amongst others.
He said following the removal of fuel subsidy and its attendant impact on the economy, the African Development Bank(AFDB) and the World Bank Group have indicated interest to assist Nigeria mitigate the impact with one billion and 1.5 billion dollars.
He said the projects and programs in the borrowing plan were selected based on positive technical economic evaluation and its expected contribution to the social economic development of the Country.
He also listed employment generation, skills acquisition, support towards emergence of entrepreneurs, poverty reduction and food security to improve the livelihood of Nigerians as reasons for the facility.
President of the Senate, Godswill Akpiabio, further mandated the committee on local and foreign debt to ensure further legislative input on the request of President Tinubu and report back in one week.
Edited By Grace Namiji
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