Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2019 election, Atiku Abubakar, has raised alarm over the rising debt profile of Nigeria.
The Debt Management Office had in a release on Wednesday said Nigeria’s total public debt rose to N24.947 trillion as of March 31, 2019 from N24.387 trillion as of December 31, 2018, growing marginally by 2.30 per cent.
The former Vice President, in a statement on Wednesday by his media adviser, Paul Ibe, said the debt figure had doubled from ₦12 trillion when President Muhammadu Buhari was inaugurated for his first term on May 29, 2015.
“As alarming as this is, what is more troubling is that between December 2018 and March 2019, the administration of General Buhari added an additional and unprecedented ₦560 billion debt to our national debt profile.
“What could this junta have needed that amount for? If you take those dates into account, they fall on the period of electioneering, when monies were freely distributed by officials of this government in the name of Tradermoni and other election gimmicks that were discontinued after the election.
“As someone who headed the National Economic Council that paid off Nigeria’s entire debt under the visionary leadership of President Olusegun Obasanjo, Atiku Abubakar has the moral authority to call those who are turning Nigeria into a beggar nation to halt the drift into unsustainable borrowing.
“We cannot continue to borrow to pay salaries and support luxuries. Already, over 50% of our revenue is going towards debt servicing, not even debt repayments,” Atiku said.
“We raise this alarm as responsible citizens and call on other lovers of Nigeria to speak up as we have no other nation to call our home, but Nigeria,” he added.
