Nigeria’s total debt stock is expected to reach N45 trillion as the Debt Management Office plans to borrow an additional N6.39 trillion to finance the 2022 budget deficit.
This was contained in a DMO document obtained on Friday in Abuja by the News Agency of Nigeria.
Patience Oniha, Director-General, DMO, explained in the document that the overall deficit in the 2022 budget was N6.30 trillion, or 3.46 percent of the country’s GDP.
According to NAN, the DMO previously revealed that the country’s total debt stock as of December 2021 was N39.55tn.
According to Oniha, the budget deficit would be financed primarily through domestic and foreign borrowings, as well as proceeds from privatization.
“N2.57 trillion will come from domestic sources, N2.57 trillion from foreign sources, N1.16 trillion from multilateral and bilateral loan drawdowns, and N90.7 billion from privatization proceeds,” she said.
According to the DG, aggregate Federal Government spending in 2022 is expected to be N17.1 trillion, an increase of 18% over the 2021 budget.
“Recurrent (non-debt) spending, estimated at N6.9tn, accounts for 40% of total expenditure and is 20% higher than the 2021 budget.”
“Aggregate capital spending of N5.96tn represents 35% of total expenditure,” she explained.
She also stated that debt service in the 2022 budget was N3.6tn, accounting for 21% of total expenditure and 34% of total revenue.
The provision to retire maturing bonds to local contractors is N270.7bn, or 1.6% of total expenditure.
“This provision is consistent with the Federal Government’s commitment to offset accumulated arrears of contractual obligations dating back more than a decade,” she explained.
