Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Mr Wale Edun says a $1.5bn zero-interest World Bank loan facility underway for Nigeria to close the gap of fiscal funding.
The Minister of Finance, Mr Wale Edun, disclosed this to State House Correspondents after the FEC meeting in Abuja on Monday. He adds that the FEC meeting approved the application for financing from the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA).
How Nigeria secured the $1.5bn zero-interest World Bank loan facility
He said that the country was able to access $1.5 billion from the IDA, which is the virtually free or zero-interest lending arm or financing arm of the World Bank.
‘’Nigeria has been able to make the kind of macro-economic moves to take the tough decisions to restore balance in the economy in the government’s finances that have warranted support.
“This had engendered support from the multilateral development banks.
‘’It is on this basis that the World Bank is willing to consider and to process on our behalf $1.5 billion of concessional financing, relatively cheap financing and financing that will be dispersed relatively quickly,’’ he said.
Edun said that another $80 million in financing from the African Development Bank was approved by the FEC for the Ekiti Knowledge Zone (EKZ) project aimed at empowering the youths in the sector of Knowledge Economy through technology and communications generally.
He said, ‘’This is basically to support young people and their quest to take on technology to use it to be employed to be trained and to benefit from being part of the knowledge economy.
“This is being part of the technological wave that is present very much in Nigeria, which is becoming a bigger and bigger share of the economy.’’