Debt servicing to gulp 60% of revenue – Ahmed

The Federal Government has planned to spend 60 percent of revenue on debt servicing,, with the ratio going up to 90 percent in some months, Minister of Finance, Budget, and National Planning, Dr. Zainab Ahmed said on Monday.

Ahmed, who was addressing a sitting of the House of Representatives Committee on Finance on the 2023-2025 Medium Term Expenditure Framework, said the 2023 budget had a proposed deficit of N11.3 trillion.

Ahmed said the government was projecting revenue of N8.46 trillion for 2023; N1.9 trillion of which would come from oil-related sources while the balance would come from non-oil sources.

She said the budget would be premised on 70 dollars per barrel of crude oil and an exchange rate of N435.57 to the dollar.

The minister said oil production for 2023 was pegged at 1.69 million barrels per day; a real GDP growth rate of 3.7 percent and the inflation rate of 17.16 percent for the year.

She hinted that the petrol subsidy would remain up to a mid-2023 sequel to the 18-month extension announced early in 2021.
Ahmed added that N3.36 trillion would be provided to pay the subsidy in 2023

The minister also told the session that there would be tighter enforcement of the performance management framework for Government-owned Enterprises that would significantly increase operating surplus/dividend remittances in 2023.

Ahmed assured that there were no projections that Nigeria would default in her debt services in the nearest future.
She assured also that while the amount currently used in debt servicing had overshot appropriation in the 2022 budget, systems had been put in place to manage the situation.“

We have been able to, consistently without fail, service our debt and we do not have any projections even in the near future that we will fail.