The total debt portfolio of Nigeria rose by N1.23trillion, from N27.4trillion as of December 2019, to N28.62trillion at the end of March this year.
The figure is contained in the public debt stock report, which was released on Thursday night by the Debt Management Office.
According to the report, the N1.23trillion represents an increase of about 4.48 per cent.
The Federal Government had, in recent times, resorted to massive borrowings in funding critical projects as a way to cushion the impact of decline in revenue on the economy.
While the government had argued that borrowing was inevitable, especially at a period like this, there had been serious concerns about the rate that these debts were being accumulated in quick succession for the country.
Apart from the claims that some of the loans were not being deployed into projects that could generate income to pay back, experts have said that borrowing should not be done in such a way as to mortgage the future of the country and its sovereignty.
Based on the report released by DMO, the country’s total external debt obligations as of the end of March this year stood at N9.98trillion.
The N9.98trillion, which is about 34.89 per cent of the country’s debt portfolio, represents an increase of N960billion when compared to the N9.02trillion recorded at end of December 2019.
For domestic debt, the DMO report put this at N18.64trillion, about 65.11 per cent of the country’s debt stock.
When compared to the domestc debt stock of N18.38trillion as of December last year, the N18.64trillion represents an increase of about N260billion.
A breakdown of the domestic debt stock showed that the Federal Government, with about N14.53trillion, accounted for a huge chunk of the local debt portfolio while the balance of N4.1trillion belongs to the states and the Federal Capital Territory.
Further analysis of the domestic debt segment of the report showed that Lagos State, with N444.22bn, was the most indebted state out of the 36 states of the federation.
Lagos State, according to analysis of the report is followed by Rivers State, with N266.93bn; Akwa Ibom with N240.04bn; and Delta, N230.75bn.
Similarly, Cross River had a debt profile of N165.91bn, Imo owed N163.99bn, Bayelsa owed N154.95bn, Ogun, N143.53bn; Osun, N137.31bn; Plateau, N130.73bn; Kogi, N128.91bn; Benue, N116.19bn; Adamawa, N101.58bn; FCT, N106.8bn; Oyo, N100.59bn; and Bauchi, N100.4bn.
Also, Abia is indebted to the tune of N69.63bn, Anambra, N33.91bn; Borno, N83.36bn; Ebonyi, N42.41bn; Edo, N84.76bn; Ekiti, N77.89bn; Enugu, N62.98bn; Gombe, N82.5bn; Jigawa, N36.02bn; Kaduna, N78.69bn; and Katsina, N66.16bn.
In the same vein, Kebbi is owing its creditors N69.26bn, Kwara, N62.89bn; Nasarawa, N60.99bn; Niger, N59.83bn; Ondo, N65.29bn; Sokoto, N47.75bn; Taraba, N81.26bn; Yobe, N29.29bn; and Zamfara, N70.84bn.
Further analysis of the report showed that the actual amount spent on domestic debt service obligations between January and March this year was N609.13bn.
A breakdown of the N608.13bn showed that about N251.35bn was used to service debt obligations in the month of January while about N158.12bn and N199.65bn went for debt service in February and March respectively.
The debt accumulation is coming at a time when key government officials in the Economic Management Team had repeatedly defended the country’s debt level, arguing that it is still within sustainable limit.
The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, had insisted that Nigeria does not have a debt problem.
She had said what the government needed to do was to increase its revenue generating capacity in order to boost revenue to about 50 per cent of Gross Domestic Product.
The finance minister had said, “Nigeria does not have a debt problem. What we have is a revenue problem.
“Our revenue to GDP is still one of the lowest among countries that are comparable to us. It is about 19 per cent of GDP and what the World Bank and IMF recommended is about 50 per cent of GDP for countries that are our size. We are not there yet. What we have is a revenue problem.”
