Posted by The Federal Government (FG) has said publicly that, following the elimination of the fuel subsidy and the harmonisation of exchange rates, it has no plans to seek external financing.
This was announced by Wale Edun, Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, at the conclusion of the first meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) in Abuja.
“The federal government is not in a position to borrow at this time,” Edun stated.
He said that the money saved by eliminating subsidies would be reinvested in various economic activities to increase tax revenue and make the country more attractive to foreign investors.
According to Edun, the extra money from the withdrawal of subsidies has allowed for a variety of short-, intermediate-, and long-term ameliorative measures to be implemented.
He also reaffirmed the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s commitment to rescuing the ailing economy.
We did a quick checkup on the state of the economy, growth rate, exchange rate, inflation, unemployment, and so on, and it was enlightening.
“The overarching conclusion is that we are not where we should be,” the president said, according to the Associated Press.
“We also examined the president’s eight-point agenda, that is, the eight priority areas for moving the Nigerian economy forward and for delivering to Nigerians, and those are basically food security; ending poverty; economic growth and job creation; access to capital, particularly consumer credit; inclusivity in all its dimensions, particularly as regards youths and women; improving security; and improving education.”
We’ll now take the marching order to refine the targets in particular and within weeks to begin rolling out policies and programs to turn around the economy and make things better for all Nigerians.
“It is around those matrices that the plans and the targets of what will be delivered in the next three years or so were identified, discussed, and inputs were given by various ministers. What he stated summed up the main points of the conversation.
Before his nomination as minister, the ex-investment banker served as Tinubu’s special adviser on monetary policy. He has pledged to prioritize repairing Nigeria’s public finances.
He also mentioned that since the naira’s devaluation in June, the government has seen an increase in revenue from the sale of crude oil.
“The federation makes dollars, and if those dollars are feeding through, at 700 or 750 naira or so to one dollar as opposed to 460 naira where it was previously, then that’s great. “That’s obviously fixing the government’s finances,” Edun remarked.
That’s the strategy, then.
Shehu Sani, a political commentator and former legislator from Kaduna Central, responded to the news by posting on X, saying, “It’s reassuring to hear from the Finance Minister that the FG has halted borrowing from both local and international sources. The debt burden left by the Buhari administration must now be addressed.