By Tony Obiechina, Abuja
The Debt Management Office (DMO) has debunked reports that Nigeria has not been transparent with information regarding the country’s public debt.
Reacting to reports that Nigeria failed the World Bank Disclosure Rule, the DMO said in a statement on Thursday night that the “Federal Government of Nigeria is one of the countries that has imbibed the principle of Transparency in Public Debt”.
According to the statement, “the website of the focal agency for this purpose, the DMO, is frequented by diverse individuals and institutions within and outside Nigeria searching for information on Nigeria’s Public Debt”.
It added that “the DMO’s website is filled with detailed information on Public Debt including debt by source, instrument, maturity, etc. The website also includes the Debt Management Strategy, and Debt Sustainability Analysis”.
Regarding some specific claims in the report, the DMO stated that “the Annual Borrowing Plan is contained in the Annual Budgets where the Total Borrowing is listed in three (3) categories, New Domestic Borrowing, New External Borrowing and Drawdown Bilateral and Multilateral Loans”.
According to the DMO, “the Public Debt Stock is published quarterly on the DMO’s website. This is supported by periodic physical and virtual media briefing sessions”.
Guaranteed Debt (Contingent Liabilities) are listed by name and amount in the DMO’s Annual Reports while information on recently contracted loans were published as at December 31, 2019, and 2020 on the DMO’s website, the statement read.
The DMO noted that “instrument coverage is comprehensive as borrowing instruments for external and internal debts are disclosed in the Quarterly Debt Reports and Annual Reports, both of which are published on the DMO’s website”.
