The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) through its national publicity secretary, Olisa Metuh says President Muhammadu Buhari is planning to borrow a minimum of five hundred billion per day to finance the six point zero eight trillion 2016 budget.
Metuh, opined thus in a press release which also challenged the Buhari-led administration to a public debate.
He noted that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) foreign exchange policy is “ill-conceived”.
“Some people may be wondering why we raised an alarm about the budget. The reason is simple, when we analyzed the budget, we discovered it is a misshapen attempt at a Keynesian economics of applying deficit spending to stimulate growth even when studies have proven that GDP growth rates decrease by over 50% when debt goes from low or moderate to high,” Metuh said.
“But then we know the borrowing here is to pay huge campaign debt and fund a political war chest. When you break down the proposed N1.84 trillion borrowing, you discover that it amounts to borrowing N5 billion every day for the 365 days in 2016.
“The questions are: for what specific projects are they borrowing N5 billion per day and how do they intend to pay back? The truth is that this administration cannot justify this proposal. There is no known economy in the world where you can justify borrowing N1.84 trillion without specific projects and precise repayment outline.” Metuh accused the government of driving Nigeria to be like Greece by plunging it into unnecessary debt.
“This is worse still in an oil-driven, mono-economy at a time crude oil is selling at $30 dollars per barrel and is speculated to go down to about $20 dollars or even lower in the next one year.
Meanwhile, in a related development, the Federal Government has proposed a sum of one point four-seven-five trillion naira1.47 to service the nation’s debt in the 2016 fiscal period.
A fiscal document, obtained from the website of the Budget Office of the Federation, shows that the sum of one point three trillion naira was planned to be spent on servicing the domestic component of the nation’s debt, while the sum of of Fifty-three point four-eight billion naira was proposed for foreign debts.