World Bank, China tops Nigeria’s creditors with $11.46bn

The World Bank and the Exim Bank of China are Nigeria’s largest creditors with a combined portfolio of $11.46bn, data obtained from the Debt Management Office have shown.

While the World Bank is a multilateral lender, the Exim Bank of China is a bilateral lender, implementing orders from the government of China especially in financing projects being executed by Chinese firms.

The World Bank Group alone has a portfolio of $8.9bn in Nigeria.

Statistics obtained from the DMO on Wednesday showed that this constituted 34.75 percent of the country’s $25.61bn external indebtedness as of March 31.

The group is made up of the International Development Association which gives out concessional loans and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development which gives out commercial loans.

The African Development Bank Group is another multilateral agency to which the country owes $1.25bn. This makes up 4.88 per cent of the nation’s external debt.

The country is indebted to the African Development Fund to the tune of $834.18m which constitutes 3.26 per cent of the country’s external debt.

Other multilateral agencies in which Nigeria is indebted include the Arab Bank for Development in Africa, Electricite de France, the Islamic Development Fund and the International Fund for Agricultural Development.

They have a portfolio of $5.88m, $59.15m, $15.51m and $176.19m respectively. These, respectively, constitute 0.02 per cent, 0.23 per cent, 0.06 per cent and 0.69 per cent of Nigeria’s external debt.

The country owes all the multilateral agencies put together the sum of $11.25bn. This constitutes 43.92 per cent of the nation’s external debt.

On the bilateral level, China is Nigeria’s biggest creditor with a portfolio of $2.55bn. This constitutes 9.96 per cent of the country’s external debt.

Chinese firms were executing key projects for the federal government worth over $47bn.

Some of the financing which would come through the Exim Bank of China are yet to be drawn down and therefore are yet to be captured.

The nation’s other bilateral creditors are France, $366.07m, (1.43 per cent); Japan, $74.63m (0.29 per cent); Exim Bank of India, $26.46m (0.10 per cent); Germany, $171.79m (0.67 per cent).

Together, bilateral creditors account for $3.19bn or 12.47 per cent of Nigeria’s external creditors.

Another category of the nation’s external debt involves the commercial loans which have been on the rise in recent times.

Eurobonds accounts for $10.87bn or 42.44 per cent of Nigeria’s external debt while Diaspora Bond accounts for $300m or 1.17 per cent of Nigeria’s debt profile.

The Diaspora Bond is an instrument through which the Federal Government borrows money from Nigerians living abroad while the Eurobond is an international bond issued in Europe.