Buhari gets approval for $5.5b loan, oil price benchmark
By Moses Uwagbale
The Senate also approved Nigeria’s $5.513 billion external loan request to fund its 2020 budget just as the National Assembly increased the oil price benchmark to $28 per barrel from the $25.
The approval of the loan would provide the much-needed liquidity to finance deficit the revised Appropriation (Amendment) Act of 2020.
It would also enable the federal government to implement and pursue some key priority activities towards the curtailment of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Flowing from this and based on clarification and information provided by the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, the Senate decided to accelerate the consideration for approval, a sum of $5,513,000,000, being the first component of the request in respect of the funding of the budget deficit proposed for the 2020 fiscal year.
“The approved $5.513 billion loan, which is to be sourced from multilateral institutions for funding on concessionary terms, include $3.4 billion to be borrowed from International Monetary Fund (IMF), $1.5 billion from World Bank, $500 million from African Development Bank (AfDB) and $133 million from Islamic Development Bank (IDB),” the report said.
The Senate, however, suspended a decision on $1.5 billion loan request to fund projects in the 36 states due to the non-availability of details to back up the projects.
Also approved is the oil benchmark proposed by the executive in the revised Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper (FSP) forwarded to the lawmakers for approval.
The two chambers also reduced from 1.9 million to 1.8 million barrel per day oil production target proposed by the executive in the MTEF/FSP documents.