The continuous borrowings by the Federal Government of Nigeria from domestic sources have sent Nigeria’s total public debt portfolio to N24.95 trillion in the first three months of this year, latest figures obtained from the Debt Management Office show on Wednesday.
The country’s debt stock rose sluggishly by 2.3 percent in the first quarter of 2019 from N24.39 trillion attained as of December 31, 2018. This compares to a growth of 4.5 percent recorded in the same period a year earlier.
At the current level, it implies Nigeria increased its total debt burden by N560 billion between December 31, 2018, and March 31, 2019.
Checks by BusinessDay revealed that although the domestic debt profile of the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja (FCT) grew the most of all the debt components, the increase in the Federal Government’s domestic debt stock largely drove the country’s total debt growth in the first quarter of this year.
The states and the FCT jointly grew their total domestic debt by 3.1 percent to N3.97 trillion as against N3.85 trillion recorded as at December 2018, but the Federal Government increased its domestic debt stock by 2.65 percent amounting to N339 billion to stand at N13.11 trillion as at end-March 2019.
As a result, the surge in the Federal Government’s domestic debt stock accounts for 60.5 percent of the total increase recorded in Nigeria’s total public debt of N24.95 trillion for the review period.
