Federal Government Sets to Take $3.45bn World Bank Loan to Finance Five Projects

On Monday, October 23, the Federal Executive Council said it was set to approve the application for a $3.45 billion loan from the World Bank to boost five items.

These projects include renewable energy, the power sector, state resource mobilisation programme, women’s empowerment project, and adolescent girls initiatives for learning and empowerment.

Wale Edun, the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, discussed with State House Correspondents that the FG will move forward to apply for the $3.5 billion “zero-interest” loan that will be repaid within the next 40 years with a 10-year moratorium, which means payment for the $3.5 billion loan will start in 2033.

He said,

• Today at the Federal Executive Council, I presented five memos, which were graciously approved by the Council. They had to do with concessional and, in many cases, zero-interest financing by the World Bank and the International Development Association, which is the very concessional financing arm.

• The projects that were approved for funding were in the power sector and then the renewable energy sector. There was funding for states for resource mobilisation programmes to help them with their internally generated revenue efforts.

• There was a project for adolescent girls’ initiative for learning and empowerment. And then finally the fifth financing that was approved was for the Women's project.

Edun said that the girl's programme will be worth $700m from the $3.5bn and these funds will be used to support girls in secondary school in getting marketable skills in addition to their school certificate.

He added,

• So those were five loans totalling $3.45bn. As you know, the tenure is all around 40 years, with a moratorium period of around 10 years and interest very low, or in the cases of loans, zero interest. However, some fees would be incurred.

Talking about the girl's programme, the Minister of Education, Dr Tahir Mamman said every state in the federation will benefit from the programme.

He said,

• Initially, from seven participating states, we will now have about 11 additional states participating in this project, which will lead to the empowerment of girls between 10 to 20 right across the participating states.

• This is a major escalation of this programme that is meant to empower our girls, our teachers, and the provision for additional schools in the country.