Fayose raises alarm over Buhari’s China trip to borrow $2bn, funding of 2016 budget with N1.84tr loan

Read the press statement below...

Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose has raised the alarm over President Mohammadu Buhari’s scheduled trip to China to borrow $2 billion as part of the N1.84 trillion programmed to be borrowed to finance the 2016 Budget, describing the move as an attempt to mortgage the future of Nigeria and its people.

The governor, who said the 2016 budget was not a reflection of the present economic reality in the country, added that; “By the time they borrow N1.84 trillion to fund their N6.06 billion budget; I wonder how Nigeria will survive in 2017 when the Federal Government will be servicing debt with about 50 percent of its budget.” It has been widely reported that Nigeria wants to raise about $5 billion abroad to cover part of its 2016 budget deficit.

This was said to be projected to hit N3 trillion ($15 billion) due to heavy infrastructure spending at a time when the slump in global oil prices has slashed its export revenues.

In a release issued on Friday by his Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, Governor Fayose said; “In elementary economics, you don’t propose to spend more when your income reduces and I still can’t understand this Buharinomics in which Nigeria is going to spend N6.06 billion with crude oil bench mark of $38 per barrel when the country budget was N4.5 trillion in 2015 when crude oil bench mark was $53 per barrel.

He said since the President claimed to have recovered and still recovering trillions of Naira looted from the treasury and over N3 trillion saved from the Treasury Single Account (TSA), the 2016 budget should be funded with the recovered fund.

The governor said he was alerting Nigerians of the danger in the federal government plan to fund the 2016 budget with loan, adding that; “Tomorrow, it will be said of me that I did not keep silent when Nigeria was being mortgaged to unnecessary debt.

He warned that with the proposed N1.84 trillion borrowing, $2 billion of which President Buhari is already going to borrow in China, the nation may soon be going the way of Greece because Nigeria will be borrowing N5 billion per day for the next 365 days. “If your income was N200, 000 per month last year and your expenditure was N195, 000 per month; does it make any economic sense for you to propose to spend N300, 000 per month this year that your income has reduced to N120, 000?

“Only President Buhari can explain to Nigerians what manner of Economic theory encourages borrowing of N1.84 trillion to fund a N6 trillion budget. As for me, it is nothing but a voodoo economic theory and Nigerians must take note that the income that should accrue to them in five years’ time is about to be spent in one year by the Buhari’s APC government,” the governor said.