Incurred Public Debts Of N10trillion ($50billion) In 10 Yrs (2007-2016)
(Onitsha Nigeria, 2nd February 2016)-The leadership of International Society for Civil Liberties & the Rule of Law (Intersociety) wishes to inform statistically that the Nigerian political leaders holding forth at the Federal, States, Local Government and Federal Capital Territory have between January 2005 and December 2016; a period of 12 years, squandered a whopping sum of N118.2trillion or $600billion. The squandered public funds are made up of generated and borrowed funds secured for the purpose of budgetary expenditures in all of the country’s public offices, between January 2005 and December 2016. The political leaders under reference include the Federal authorities, the authorities in charge of the country’s 36 States and 774 constitutionally recognized Local Government Areas (LGAs) as well as the authorities of the Federal Capital Territory (Abuja); numbering 17,500, made up of elected and appointed public office holders in the executive, legislative and judicial arms of government.
The political authorities under reference, have also between June 2007 and December 2016; a period of ten years, incurred staggering public debts of over N10trillion or $50billion from local and international sources; comprising States and Federal Government’s local and foreign loans. Nigeria’s official or public total debts as at May 2007 stood at $23.5billion; comprising local debts of N1.8trillion ($20billion: 140.00/US$) and foreign debts of $3.5billion. This was after its $30billion foreign loans were liquidated in 2006 courtesy of Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and leading international lending institutions. But by the end of December 2016, Nigeria’s current total public debts must have risen to over N14.6trillion or $73billion. The Buhari’s federal Presidency alone has proposed a public borrowing of over $9billion or N1.84trillion in the 2016 budget proposal. Average of 20%-30% of 2016 budget proposal of each State in Nigeria is also expected to be funded from local or international borrowings.
When added, the country’s total official or public debts will be raised to as much as $80billion or N16trillion by the end of December 2016. The country’s current official public debts as at June 2015 were quoted by DMO as “N11.1trillion or $63.8billion”, using old official exchange rate of N155/US$. This is no longer fiscally realistic. Crookedness is also associated with government local borrowings in Nigeria; making it difficult for DMO to appropriately capture every kobo borrowed locally particularly by State Governments. As a matter of fact, totality of public borrowed funds in Nigeria both openly and illicitly borrowed; is strongly believed to be in the neighborhood of $80billion to $90billion or N18trillion or even more. Nigeria had also spent a whopping sum of N2.95trillion or $15billion in the past five years (2010-2014) in debts servicing. It is also feared in many informed quarters that Nigeria’s current public debts may most likely double at the end of President Buhari’s embattled administration by 2019, owing to alarming rates with which loans are being borrowed by his administration and subordinates of his administration particularly the State Governors.

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