FG to Release N350 billion for capital projects

The Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun has disclosed that a sum of
N350 billion capital votes will be released immediately into the system as
the Federal Government continues to tackle the economic crisis currently
facing the nation.

The Minister, who spoke at a press briefing in Abuja on Friday, said the
current administration is not backing down on its decision to stimulate
the economy. “With the N350 billion to be released, next week, the
federal government would have released the total sum of N770 billion for
capital projects this year, having released N420 billion thus far in
2016.”
She explained that the bulk of the money so far released went into
on-going projects, especially works, defence, transportation, interior,
power and agriculture.

$1bn Eurobond before year-end

The minister also disclosed that the administration was working on raising
$1 billion Eurobond. The proceeds for this would be used only for capital
projects.

Giving further clarifications on the Eurobond issue, Director-General,
Debt Management Office (DMO), Dr. Abraham Nwankwo, said, “We intend to raise the money before the year ends. In terms of the progress made so
far, more than five weeks ago we put out advertisements for Request For
Proposals in local and international media, following due process so that
we can allow transaction partners who are interested to compete. “The
closing date of the RFPs is September 19, 2016 and immediately after that
we will execute the process of vetting and selection. “We have a directive
to make sure we use minimum time to conclude all these activities. So we
assure you that we are going to cut the time because of the emergency
situation. Before the middle of December, we will have the money. We are
very focused on the fact that these monies are needed urgently to turn
around the economy and we are working on that.” Truncating bidding
process.

On the issue of bidding process and open procurement, the minister
explained that what is needed is a balance between speed and transparency, saying that is why we are engaging the National Assembly to support our request to truncate the process. “We are already
talking to members of the National Assembly, explaining to them why this
is necessary so that when we release money, it is not just going to be
sitting in the TSA account but it will actually be going down into
contractors and appropriately utilised,” she stated.