The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has criticised the external loan request of President Muhammadu Buhari as an attempt by the All Progressives Congress-led Federal Government to mortgage the lives of unborn Nigerian children for many years to come, even as the Senate yesterday began consideration of the President\u2019s request.
\nIn a statement signed by the party\u2019s National Publicity Secretary, Prince Dayo Adeyeye yesterday, the PDP said \u201cit received with shock, the plan by the All Progressives Congress-led Federal Government to plunge Nigeria into further debt, and consciously mortgage the Future of our unborn generations through needless and mindless borrowing of the sum of $5.5billion.
\n\u201cLike other well-meaning Nigerians, we consider this new bid for a foreign loan of $5.5billion being sought by the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari as an attempt to push the nation down into the black hole of debt that will affect negatively, the future of this nation,\u201d the party lamented.
\nIt stated that, \u201cAs a party that governed this nation meritoriously for 16 years and handed over a buoyant economy to the APC in 2015, we are concerned that by the time Nigerians would have the opportunity to push out the APC government in 2019, the economy of the nation would have been damaged irreparably.
\n\u201cFor emphasis, we are dismayed at the rate by which the APC is plunging the nation into debt through local and foreign borrowing without concomitant developmental projects in any sphere of the nation\u2019s economy to justify the huge borrowing,\u201d Adeyeye noted.
\n\u201cThe figure released recently by the Debt Management Office (DMO) stating that the nation under the administration of the APC government in the last two years of being in office, has borrowed N7.51trillion is mind-boggling.
\n\u201cMind-boggling because all-round infrastructural decay has now reached alarming proportions. The roads have deteriorated, the state of power supply has become worse, and there is no increase in wages to match the skyrocketing inflation. As a result, workers in educational institutions and other government agencies have spent more time at home observing strike action than they spent at work; insecurity has sky-rocketed beyond what anyone can imagine, while those in power continue to delude themselves that they are providing plausible leadership for the country,\u201d the party said.
\n\u201cWe are constrained to ask the government of President Muhammadu Buhari to explain to Nigerians what his government has done with the several huge sums borrowed in the last two years in the name of financing infrastructural development in the country.
\n\u201cThe data shows that since President Buhari was sworn-in, the nation\u2019s debt has risen by 61.96 per cent in only two years.
\n\u201cAs major stakeholders in the Nigerian Project, we are worried that if the National Assembly does not stop this latest demand for foreign loan, the money when released, will go the way of other loans obtained in the last two years without any tangible result to show for it,\u201d the PDP said.
\nMeanwhile, the Senate has begun consideration of President Muhammadu Buhari\u2019s request for the approval of an external loan of $5.5billion to enable the Federal Government finance the 2017 budget as well as re-finance domestic debts.
\nThe move by the Senate to commence consideration of the external loan request followed Executive Communication by the Senate Leader, Senator Ahmad Lawan, yesterday, who said that the \u201cSenate do consider the Request of Mr.. President C-in-C for the Approval of External Loans for: 1. Issuance of $2.5billion to finance the 2017 Appropriation Act; and ii. $3billion to re- finance debts.\u201d
\nAfter the communication, Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, who presided over yesterday\u2019s plenary session, referred the request to the Senator Shehu Sani, APC, Kaduna Central-led Senate Committee Foreign and Local Debts, and report back in two weeks.
\nIt would be recalled that President Muhammadu Buhari had, last Tuesday, written to the Senate, asking for the approval of an external loan of $5.5billion to enable the Federal Government finance the 2017 budget.
\nBuhari\u2019s request for external borrowing to the tune of $5.5billion was contained in a letter to the Senate President, Dr Bukola Saraki which was read on the floor of the Senate.
\nThe four-page letter, which was addressed to Senate president, was entitled, \u201cRequest for the approval of External Loans for: 1. Implementation of the External Borrowing Approved in the 2017 Appropriation Act: 11 External Borrowing to Re-finance maturing domestic debts through the issuance of $3.00billion Eurobond in the International Capital Market or through a loan syndication.\u201d
\nAccording to the letter, while $3billion would be sourced through Eurobond, the remaining $2.5 would come from other sources in the international capital market.
\nBuhari had, however, allayed fears of Nigerians on possible effect or problems that may come up; saying that the proposed external borrowing of $3.0billion re-finance maturing domestic debt would not lead to an increase in the public debt portfolio against the backdrop that the debt exists, already in the form of high interest short term domestic debt.
\nAccording to him, the substitution of domestic debt with relatively cheaper and long-term external debt will lead to a significant decrease in debt service cost, just as he said that government\u2019s moves in re-financing of domestic debt through external debt would also achieve more stability in the debt stock, adding that it would create more borrowing space in the domestic market for the private sector.
\nAlso recall that the Senate had, last week, stepped down the recommendation of its committee to consider the issue of external borrowing for the executive on grounds that it was yet to receive any formal request in that regards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has criticised the external loan request of President Muhammadu Buhari as an attempt by the All Progressives Congress-led Federal Government to mortgage the lives of unborn Nigerian children for many years to come, even as the Senate yesterday began consideration of the President\u2019s request. In a statement signed by the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":162934,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76,26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-162933","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-front-pix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162933","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=162933"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162933\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/162934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=162933"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=162933"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=162933"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}