Amid attempts by the country to borrow more from external sources, Nigeria has in the past five years spent $1.62bn to service its external debts that include loans secured for what turned out to be white elephant projects, EVEREST AMAEFULE writes.
In the past five years, Nigeria has spent $1.62bn for servicing of external loans contracted by both the federal and state governments. A breakdown of statistics obtained from the Debt Management Office showed that the country paid $293,003,540 for external debt servicing in 2012. The following year, the amount stood at $297,329,300.
In 2014, a total of $346,723,290 was paid to external creditors. The amount came down slightly in 2015 to $331,059,850, but moved up a bit to $353,093,540 last year. Nigeria’s external debt stood at $6,527,070,000 on December 31, 2012. However, over the past five years, it has grown to $11,406,028,000.
