Debt and Development Issues
Debt negotiating team in London
Jul 21, 2003, 17:19
| | The Federal Government has initiated efforts to normalise relations with its creditors and to recover funds allegedly looted by General Sani Abacha, his relatives and associates.
For this purpose, a team headed by the newly appointed Finance Minister, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, left for London on 20 July.
Other members of the team include Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and Professor Charles Soludo, Special Adviser to the President on the Economy.
One of the high priorities of this Government is to recover stolen funds estimated at four billion dollars.
Apart from holding discussions with the British Government on the possibility of recovering embezzled funds, the team will also begin preliminary negotiations over Nigeria’s debt.
The initial visit to Britain is strategic since the larger percentage of Nigeria’s external debt to the Paris Club is owed to this former colonial master.
In order to avoid serious economic problems, the Obasanjo Administration is seeking a rescheduling of the country’s debts by its creditors.
Nigeria’s total external debt stock, interests, principals and penalties, all put together as of 31 August 2001, stood at $28.4billion.
In 2001, the National Assembly approved a total of two billion dollars in the appropriation bill for external debt servicing, out of which one billion was paid to the Paris Club while the other one billion went to other creditors.
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