NBS Puts Nigeria’s Foreign Debt Stock at $11.4bn in 2016

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has said Nigeria’s foreign debt stood at $11.41 billion while its domestic debts was N14.02 trillion respectively in 2016.

The NBS stated in ‘Nigerian Domestic and Foreign Debt – 2016’ data, posted on its website yesterday in Abuja, that the sum reflected the states’ and federal debt stock.

The report, according to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), showed that $7.99 billion of the debt was multilateral; $198.25 million was bilateral (AFD) while $3.22 billion from the Exim Bank of China credited to the federal government.

“Total federal government debt accounted for 68.72 per cent of Nigeria’s total foreign debt while all states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) accounted for the remaining 31.28 per cent.

“Similarly, total federal government debt accounted for 78.89 per cent of Nigeria’s total domestic debt while all states and the FCT accounted for the 21.11 per cent balance.’’

The report further gave a breakdown of the federal government domestic debt stock by instruments reflected that N7.56 trillion or 68.41 per cent of the debt were in federal government bonds.

“About N3.28 trillion or 29.64 per cent are in treasury bills and N215.99 million or 1.95 per cent are in treasury bonds.

“Lagos State has the highest foreign debt profile among the 36 states and the FCT accounting for 38.70 per cent.

“Kaduna (6.25 per cent), Edo (5.15 per cent), Cross River (3.22 per cent and Ogun (2.90 per cent) followed closely,’’ NBS added.

Similarly, the report stated that Lagos State had the highest domestic debt profile among the 36 states and the FCT, accounting for 10.54 per cent.

“Delta (8.15 per cent), Akwa Ibom (5.25 per cent), FCT (5.16 per cent) and Osun (4.97 per cent) followed in that order,’’ the report stated.