President Bola Tinubu has urged the Senate to approve the securitization of the remaining balance of Ways and Means revenue within the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF) of Nigeria.
This request was conveyed in a letter addressed to the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, and was read during Saturday’s plenary.
“I wish to draw the Senate’s attention to Section 38 of the CBN Act 2007, which allows the apex bank to provide temporary advances to the Federal Government in the case of a temporary deficiency in budget revenue, provided such overdrafts do not exceed five per cent of the previous year’s government revenue,” Tinubu stated.
He highlighted that the CRF account of the Federal Government stood at N7.3 trillion as of December 2023 due to domestic debt servicing, including principal and interest.
“Considering various measures to prevent the reliance on ways and means advances for domestic debt servicing, it has become crucial to securitize the outstanding ways and means advance of the Federal Government before the year-end,” Tinubu added.
He enumerated the advantages of securitization, emphasising reduced debt service costs with the interest rate for the securitized ways and means lowered to nine per cent from the previous three per cent.
“In light of the above, the Senate is requested to kindly deliberate and approve the securitization of the outstanding debit balance of N7.3 trillion as of December 2023,” the letter concluded. (NAN)
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