For Nigeria’s bankrupt states, it’s business as usual

Only one of Nigeria’s 36 states was represented at the 2023 Africa Investment Forum in Marrakech, Morocco. No prizes for guessing the state whose governor was at the event courting private capital for mega projects from a Hollywood-type film city to an ambitious airport that will serve the entire West Africa.

That only Lagos State, the richest of the lot and least dependent on federal handouts, was the only one that had projects that needed financing from the thousands of global investors that converged at Africa’s premier investment platform is rather shameful.

No less than 18 Nigerian states are in dire financial straits, with internally generated revenue at a record low. But they’ll rather take the easier route of going cap in hand to the federal government for bailout funds to invest in critical infrastructure than design bankable projects that will appeal to investors, quicken the pace of development in their states and create badly-needed jobs for their people.

Perhaps, the governors of these states who live lavish lifestyles are not in need of private capital to quicken the pace of development in their states but the millions of Nigerians whom they represent must feel let down. Their absence at the AIF is no one-off, but the latest of a long list of instances where they are failing to seize opportunities to tap private capital.

To be fair, some state governors had other engagements while the AIF was ongoing. Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State; Governor Dikko Radda of Katsina State and Governor Umar Bago of Niger State were among the Nigerian delegation present with President Bola Tinubu at a meeting in Saudi Arabia.

It’s however unclear if these governors, all of whom are from the northern part of Nigeria, simply took an opportunity to be at the cradle of Islam in Mecca or were there seeking investments in their respective states.

Other governors may have had engagements preventing them from attending the AIF but one of the multitude of investors at the forum said if the governors did have projects that needed private capital they would have sent representatives.

“It’s either they have no projects to pitch or they don’t see the need to be here at all, which would be a great surprise,” the investor who said his firm had invested over $1 billion across Africa since 2018 said.

Since its first edition, the AIF has had a reputation for mobilizing vast sums of capital for big infrastructure projects across the continent.

The $24 bn Liquified Natural Gas Project of Mozambique, the $15.6 bn Lagos-Abidjan Highway, or the $2.6bn Ai SkyTrain in Accra, are all deals that came out of the ‘invitation-only’ boardrooms settled alongside the event.

Four years ago, the AIF helped secure 52 deals worth $40bn in investment. Since then, Dr Adesina and his colleagues – Africa50, Afreximbank, African Finance Corporation, European Investment Bank, Islamic Development Bank, Trade and Development Bank, and the Development Bank of Southern Africa – are on a mission to market the continent’s untapped financial potential to African and international investors.

Bankrupt states

Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, boasts a federal system of government with 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory.

However, beneath the surface of this decentralized structure lies a financial quagmire, as many Nigerian states grapple with weak financial health.

A primary contributor to the financial woes of Nigerian states is the persistently low levels of internally generated revenues.

IGR constitutes funds generated by states from taxes, fees, and other revenue sources within their jurisdiction. Unfortunately, many states have struggled to implement effective revenue-generating mechanisms, resulting in a disproportionate dependence on federal allocations.

Several factors contribute to the challenges in boosting IGR. A lack of diversified economic activities, informal economies, and high levels of unemployment hinder the potential for states to generate substantial revenue internally. Additionally, issues such as corruption, inadequate tax administration, and a dearth of investment-friendly policies further compound the problem.

The lack of sufficient IGR means the states are heavily dependent on federal allocations, a trend that has exacerbated their financial fragility.

These allocations, which come from the Federation Account, consist of revenues generated from oil and non-oil sources at the national level. The volatility of oil prices, a key driver of Nigeria’s revenue, leaves states vulnerable to economic shocks.

As seen in the past, fluctuations in oil prices can significantly impact the amount of revenue disbursed to states. During periods of low oil prices, federal allocations decrease, leaving states struggling to meet their financial obligations, including the payment of salaries and the execution of critical developmental projects.

The repercussions of the states’ weak financial health are manifold. They find it challenging to invest in critical sectors such as healthcare, education, and infrastructure, hindering the overall socio-economic development of the regions. Moreover, the inability to pay workers’ salaries and pensions contributes to a cycle of economic downturn, as citizens face financial instability, reducing their purchasing power and affecting local businesses.

“The high level of insecurity in the states also contributes to their unattractiveness to investors,” another investor at the AIF said.

Five charts showing the poor financial health of several states

https://businessday.ng/business-economy/article/for-nigerias-bankrupt-states-its-business-as-usual/
Mynd44 nlfpmod

Only one of Nigeria’s 36 states was represented at the 2023 Africa Investment Forum in Marrakech, Morocco. No prizes for guessing the state whose governor was at the event courting private capital for mega projects from a Hollywood-type film city to an ambitious airport that will serve the entire West Africa.

That only Lagos State, the richest of the lot and least dependent on federal handouts, was the only one that had projects that needed financing from the thousands of global investors that converged at Africa’s premier investment platform is rather shameful.

Excellent legacy of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR and current President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
God bless Asiwaju Tinubu.

This is a wake up call to all the other State Governors to be more disciplined fiscally and address the lack of sustained human and infrastructural investment in their states in order to attract investments. Bayelsa state can literally buy Adamawa and should by far be more prosperous. Unfortunately, there's no difference between Bayelsa state and Adamawa. Smh.

Btw,Benue tried with capital importation despite all the herdsmen this, herdsmen that report we got inundated with during HE Ortom's tenure. I hope this capital reflected in the state.

Fundamentally, this report reiterates that Lagos state remains the undisputed No 1 investment destination in Nigeria and Africa.

Invest in Lagos today and the neighbouring Yoruba South West states to enjoy great returns on investment and the best investor friendly experience.
God bless Nigeria for ever! Check my signature for free stuffs!

Who's to blame if not the current horse rider

The president of the bankrupt country itself borrowing to pay salaries, spent billions buying luxury cars and items for himself and his family.

Corruption and business as usual from top to bottom

Did you know??



These hard times, this pain, these lessons one day they’ll be your strength, your awareness and your blessings.


i Promise youu👍

them don expose oladips fake d£ath


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sy5bpAhYKaY

Anytime sukanmi gets his allowance he comes to create a thread to chest beat about Lagos 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Funny thing is he is not from Lagos he is from Osun state 🤣🤣🤣

He is struggling to survive like 99% of other Nigerians but comes online to chest beat and abuse other tribes 🤣

What a time to be alive to see so many strange characters everyday 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Nothing fascinating here.

Damning report on the country.

Ok

This shows that most of the people in elected positions are not leaders but just selfish and ignorant people who disguise to take advantage of people who are not saying what they should say there was a country

Nigerians are really Enjoying this Gonfanment

Meanwhile one struggling young boy who reside at the outskirt of my estate and cohabiting with his Afesona which i thought had prospect just gave his wife belle

I surely knew it will happen. It's just a matter of time. In Nigeria, Once a matured male and female starts cohabiting. Na belle go be the final outcome

There was a CornTree

BTW, You can check my signature for business.

What a terrible country

MR. PRESIDENT, PLEASE ADOPT FAPRES FOTCS AND CTC FOCS TRFG AND LET OUR 36 CONSTITUTIONAL STATES KNOW THE TRUE MEANING AND PROCESS OF BUDGETARY CONTROLS.

This really calls for a great concern. Today...i mean just a few minutes ago, I opened one of the apps used in transacting in foreign currencies and what I saw with 1USD to CFA shocked me. This is the currency held in the brands of the so called mushrooms counties in Africa..

They import more goods than we do and export less.

Many of them don't even have crude oil.

If you talk, their supporters wouid mob you and say, Francophone countries are being controlled by France, as if the west isn't controlling our currency indirectly too. When they told tinubu to devalue naira and increase fuel price to 500 naira and above, Mr Lagos magician and wondeman heeded their instructions without looking back and considering the consequences. He unleashed hardship on the masses. What has the currency floatation achieved so far? I leave everyone to answer that. During global recession, Nigeria didn't experience it. But the west wasn't happy. Now, they've gotten us, under tinubu by manipulating our economy.

Whereas, Angola, a country rich in crude ended subsidy too but only removed it gradually and kept the rest, so their people won't feel the pain, unlike tinubu who removed everything completely. Even if Buhari didn't include it in the budget, is he still in power now? Sadly, subsidy is back and the same western world who cajoled him are now warning him of possible economic doom...that's how a callous leader behaves, someone who doesn't care for his people but prefers to enrich a group of elites at the expense of the masses. I travelled to Benin in 2016 and exchanged 1000 naira for about 10,000 cefa. Now, naira is worthless, compared to cefa.

The problem isn't the amount of imports we do, as they blindly posit in order to deceive the gullible. The problem is corruption and mismanagement of funds.

Here in Lagos, a km of road will be constructed at 3 times the contract price. They'd share the rest and be hailing the government. Only ambode used the state's funds judiciously and he was punished for doing so because he blocked the loopholes. Years to come, we won't stop talking about this great man.

There are counties in the west who don't even export much but import almost everything yet, they are among the developed countries globally. I feel ashamed reading this news as a Nigerian.

Governance is an eyesore in this country. You would see an average mediocre of a governor innovating nothing to facilitate wealth creation within his state. All he does is rely on federal handouts and pay civil servants regularly to avoid bad rep. To crown it all, he should borrow from China to do some roads that add no real credence to the economic value chain. Surprisingly, he would be hailed as a working governor.

WiszyFraud:
Did you know??



These hard times, this pain, these lessons one day they’ll be your strength, your awareness and your blessings.


i Promise youu👍

Motigbetional.

EleventhWeirdo:
Governance is an eyesore in this country. You would see an average mediocre of a governor innovating nothing to facilitate wealth creation within his state. All he does is rely on federal handouts and pay civil servants regularly to avoid bad rep. To crown it all, he should borrow from China to do some roads that add no real credence to the economic value chain. Surprisingly, he would be hailed as a working governor.

Exactly. I just posted something similar to this. Any tourist on NL reading this should visit a small town in Germany called Gackenbach. Its a twin of Lokoja in Nigeria. Germans constructed an elevator from the bottom of the hill to the top. On the top are hotels, hospitals, restaurants, etc. . The top of the hill is as flat as a football pitch covering several hectars of land, same as the Mount Patti in lokoja where I had driven up to see, including Lord Lagard's House. That place can accommodate an airport and a massive estate. Its as flat as anything. The land on the hilltop is bigger than the entire portion inhabited by lokoja residents. Such an amazing tourist attraction is just wasting away and yahaya bello was shouting upandan. He shouted for 8 years and ended up enriching his friends and family, including his wife who was caught with a huge sum of dollars. That's how they rule in my county. Whereas, they travel kilometres away to visit same natural endowment elsewhere, wasting taxpayers money. We'd be wise someday

Pay attention to the message and leave the messenger.

Hold your unpatriotic governors accountable, is your intelligence too low to comprehend that boy?

CallmeTrinity:
Anytime sukanmi gets his allowance he comes to create a thread to chest beat about Lagos 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Funny thing is he is not from Lagos he is from Osun state 🤣🤣🤣

He is struggling to survive like 99% of other Nigerians but comes online to chest beat and abuse other tribes 🤣

What a time to be alive to see so many strange characters everyday 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Please naira fall to C$1 to 10000ngn just for 3 days

🤦🏽‍♂️

Wetin concern dem? Shebi FG dey share oyel money including the tax wey FG dey collect from beer?

We need competition. We needd states from different regions that would compete with Lagos...

FreeStuffsNG:
Only one of Nigeria’s 36 states was represented at the 2023 Africa Investment Forum in Marrakech, Morocco. No prizes for guessing the state whose governor was at the event courting private capital for mega projects from a Hollywood-type film city to an ambitious airport that will serve the entire West Africa.

That only Lagos State, the richest of the lot and least dependent on federal handouts, was the only one that had projects that needed financing from the thousands of global investors that converged at Africa’s premier investment platform is rather shameful.

Excellent legacy of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR and current President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
God bless Asiwaju Tinubu.

This is a wake up call to all the other State Governors to be more disciplined fiscally and address the lack of sustained human and infrastructural investment in their states in order to attract investments. Bayelsa state can literally buy Adamawa and should by far be more prosperous. Unfortunately, there's no difference between Bayelsa state and Adamawa. Smh.

[b]Btw,Benue tried with capital importation [/b]despite all the herdsmen this, herdsmen that report we got inundated with during HE Ortom's tenure. I hope this capital reflected in the state.

Fundamentally, this report reiterates that Lagos state remains the undisputed No 1 investment destination in Nigeria and Africa.

Invest in Lagos today and the neighbouring Yoruba South West states to enjoy great returns on investment and the best investor friendly experience.
God bless Nigeria for ever! Check my signature for free stuffs!

What you attached shows that Benue is among the states that are nearly totally dependant on the FG - how did they try in capital importation??

Eriokanmi:
This really calls for a great concern. Today...i mean just a few minutes ago, I opened one of the apps used in transacting in foreign currencies and what I saw with 1USD to CFA shocked me. This is the currency held in the brands of the so called mushrooms counties in Africa..

They import more goods than we do and export less.

Many of them don't even have crude oil.

If you talk, their supporters wouid mob you and say, Francophone countries are being controlled by France, as if the west isn't controlling our currency indirectly too. When they told tinubu to devalue naira and increase fuel price to 500 naira and above, Mr Lagos magician and wondeman heeded their instructions without looking back and considering the consequences. He unleashed hardship on the masses. What has the currency floatation achieved so far? I leave everyone to answer that. During global recession, Nigeria didn't experience it. But the west wasn't happy. Now, they've gotten us, under tinubu by manipulating our economy.

Whereas, Angola, a country rich in crude ended subsidy too but only removed it gradually and kept the rest, so their people won't feel the pain, unlike tinubu who removed everything completely. Even if Buhari didn't include it in the budget, is he still in power now? Sadly, subsidy is back and the same western world who cajoled him are now warning him of possible economic doom...that's how a callous leader behaves, someone who doesn't care for his people but prefers to enrich a group of elites at the expense of the masses. I travelled to Benin in 2026 and exchange 1000 naira for about 10,000 cefa. Now, naira is worthless, compared to cefa.

The problem isn't the amount of imports we do, as they blindly posit on order to deceive the gullible. The problem is corruption and mismanagement of funds.

Here in Lagos, a km of road will be constructed with 3 times the contract price. They'd share the rest and be hailing the government. Only ambode used the state's funds judiciously and he was punished for doing so because he blocked the loopholes. Years to come, we won't stop talking about this great man.

There are counties in the west who don't even export much but import almost everything yet, they are among the developed countries globally. I feel ashamed reading this news as a Nigerian.

You may have valid points but this is not one of them. You are asking what a long-term economic policy has achieved in the short term. doesn't work like that. The essence of some of these policies is to encourage investment - investors are not going to simply jump into your country the next day. It's a process.

Lagos lead other state follows.