By Nuel Suji – Minister of finance, Kemi Adeosun on Sunday has urged Nigerians to tolerate more debt to allow the Muhammadu Buhari-led administration deliver on its plans for the country.
Adeosun advocated for more debt at a joint press conference with Godwin Emefiele, Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, in Washington DC.
“I assure you that this government is very prudent around debt. We don’t borrow recklessly and we have no intention of bequeathing unserviceable debts on Nigerians.”
Adeosun said the finance ministry and Debt Management Office (DMO) have been monitoring state governments to ensure that they don’t borrow more than they can service.
“Any state government has to come to us to get an approval to borrow. We perform debt sustainability analysis and if the repayment is more than 40 per cent of their revenue, we turn it down. So many people are talking of how many loans we are approving, they don’t talk about how many loans we are turning down,” she said.
“Many do not go through and we are constantly monitoring state governments to ensure that the debts that they take on is sustainable. The problem with some of the states that have debt problems are legacy issues that were there before they came in. But since, we came in, we have been very strict, trying to make sure states do not borrow more than they can service.”