Akinwumi Adesina, president of the African Development Bank (AfDB), says Nigeria needs help from the international community in tackling its debt burden.
Speaking at the Nigeria International Economic Partnership
Forum in New York on Thursday, Adesina said financing is critical to solving
Nigeria’s development challenges.
“Financing is critical because the debt to GDP ratio of
Africa has increased to 70 percent — several countries are the risk of high
debt distress due to unstable, unsustainable debt levels,” he said.
“Nigeria’s total debt level is N42.84 trillion or $103
billion. External debt levels stand at N16.61 trillion or $40 billion. Ladies
and gentlemen, Nigeria needs help to tackle this debt burden.
“International
partnerships on debt are helping Africa, and Nigeria. The issuance of special
drawing rights (SDR) by the International Monetary Fund of $650 billion helped
provide liquidity support for countries. However, Africa only received $33
billion out of all of that. Pretty small.
“A call made by the African heads of State for developed
economies to rechannel $100 billion of additional SDRs to Africa will go a long
way to reduce the debt burden in Nigeria.
“Allocating this SDR, some of this, through the African
Development Bank will actually allow us to leverage it four times because we
are a leveraging machine. We can deliver more financing to Nigeria and Africa.
Nigeria and other African countries, in my view, therefore
need debt relief. They cannot run up the hill carrying a backpack full of
sand.”
He said African countries, including Nigeria, need
international partnership to tackle climate change.
Adesina said to understand this, all you have to do is take
a look at Lake Chad in Nigeria, stating that the continent loses $15 billion as
a result of climate change.
‘INVESTING IN NIGERIA IS LIKE ROSES WITH THORNS’
The AFDB president said while there are roses in Nigeria,
“roses come with thorns” and that Nigeria’s huge economic potential also comes
with a few thorns.
“Those thorns should not discourage us, they
call on us to strengthen international partnerships around Nigeria. Nigeria’s growth
will be conditioned on its ability to fix its massive infrastructure deficit.
He said the National Integrated Infrastructure masterplan
shows Nigeria would need a total finacing of $759 billion up until 2043.
Adesina concluded his intervention by saying referring to a
classic by Michael Jackson, asking Nigeria leaders to look at the man in the
mirror, and change where necessary
“I’m talking about the man in the mirror, I’m asking him
also to change his ways. We must change our ways sometimes. To attract greater
foreign direct investment to Nigeria, we must fix security, capital does not
like to be troubled.
“With the right
conditions in place, we can confidently say Nigeria is a great investment
destination; believe in us, invest in us, invest with us, and you will not be
disappointed,” he concluded.
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com