FG Borrowing Sensibly To Fund Infrastructure, Says Zainab Ahmed

Nigeria’s finance minister, Zainab Ahmed has expressed that the federal government is borrowing “sensibly” to cater to the country’s infrastructure needs.

Sheh stated this while addressing a press conference on the recent report by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) on the growth of the economy.

Ahmed stated that if Nigeria does not invest in infrastructure, “we will regret it”.

As of March 2021, Nigeria’s total public debt had hit N33.1 trillion. Many have expressed concern about the rate at which the government is borrowing to finance infrastructure projects.

Commenting on the concerns, the minister expressed that the investments will be beneficial to the country in the future.

Also Read: 2022 Budget: FG To Borrow N4.89tn, Says Finance Minister

“We are borrowing sensibly and we are investing in rail and other infrastructure,” she said on Monday in Abuja.

“If we do not do these investments, we will regret. [These] investments will return revenue in the future.

“The 2021 second quarter growth reflects better economic performance compared to the same quarter last year. The same quarter last year, we had a negative growth of -6.10 percent. It is also better than the first quarter of 2021,” she said.

“The service sector recorded a strong performance, growing by 9.27 percent this reporting quarter, representing the fastest growth in this sector since 2010.

“The second quarter growth of 2021 would have been much stronger than the 5.01 percent but for agriculture that recorded a slightly lower growth.

“A number of bottlenecks within the system including insecurity which has negatively affected the sector negatively. Also, the industrial sector slowed down to -1.3 percent.”

The minister added that the non-oil sector contributed majorly to the growth witnessed in the second quarter.

“The non-oil sector recorded a growth of 7 percent which represents the fastest growth since the third quarter of 2014,” she said.