Funds recovered from the late General Abacha and repatriated by the United States Department of Justice and Island of Jersey boosted Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority’s (NSIA) income by 74 percent.
The NSIA is an agency of the government that manages Nigeria’s sovereign wealth fund.
Speaking at a briefing to present the financial performance of the agency, the Managing Director of the NSIA, Mr. Uche Orji said the Authority received $311million (N117.87 billion) from funds recovered from the late General Abacha from the US Department of Justice and Island of Jersey.
The report on the activities and performance in 2020 showed that the NSIA recorded 343 per cent growth in Total Comprehensive Income to N160.06bn in 2020 as against N36.15 billion in 2019.
Excluding the devaluation gain of N51bn, it stated that core income of N109bn was recorded in 2020 compared to N33.07bn in 2019.
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This amount, according to Orji, was deployed towards the Presidential Infrastructure Development Fund for construction projects of Abuja-Kaduna-Kano Highway, Lagos Ibadan Expressway and Second Niger Bridge.
The NSIA said it received an additional contribution of $250 million; and provided first stabilisation support to the federal government where $150m was withdrawn from the Stabilisation Fund, which was used to augment the July 2020 FAAC to all three tiers of government.
The net assets of the NSIA grew by 33 per cent to N772.75 billion in 2020 in spite the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
The audited financial report for 2020 showed that Authority’s assets increased by N193.21billion in 2020 higher than the N579.54billion recorded in 2019 despite the COVID-19 pandemic, it said in a statement on Tuesday.
In the area of agriculture, he said the Presidential Fertilizer Initiative produced 12m 50kg bags of NPK 20:10:10 equivalent in 2020, bringing total production since inception to over 30m bags equivalent. The blending plants also rose from about seven to 44 last year.
In the area of Gas Industrialisation, he noted that the Authority is progressing on developing the Ammonia and Diammonium phosphate production plants in partnership with OCP.
For the Stabilisation Fund, he said the Authority has been able to liquidate a portion of the Stabilisation Fund assets in 2020 to meet the $150m redemption that augmented the July 2020 FAAC to all three tiers of government.
