Following a recent revelation of the nation’s debt of about 77 trillion Naira, the presidential candidate of the African Action Congress, AAC, Omoyele Sowore, on Thursday, accused President Muhammadu Buhari of “borrowing Nigeria back to Stone Age.”
Recall that the Director-General, DG, of the Debt Management Office, Patience Oniha disclosed recently during a public presentation of the 2023 budget, that Nigeria’s public debt burden may hit N77 trillion if the National Assembly approved the request by President Muhammadu Buhari to restructure the Ways and Means Advances.
However, Sowore stated that if elected president in 2023, the repayment of the 77 trillion naira in debt amassed by the previous administration would be suspended until a thorough audit is conducted.
Sowore who played host to a television presidential interview, in Lagos, also explained that his government would prefer to use available resources on infrastructure development in addition to other urgent needs of the nation rather than paying down the N77 trillion debt.
His words: “As President, I am going to pause repayment of debts until I audit the debts, that is what I will do first and foremost when I am sworn in. I am not paying any debt until the audits are properly done.
“This is because we need money to fix the country because Buhari has borrowed Nigeria back to the Stone Age; everybody has agreed on that. But, our problem is not the debt to GDP ratio, our problem is debt to revenue ratio, and the revenue, we will aggressively increase.”
Speaking on his plans to increase the revenue generation of the country, if elected, he said: “I have said this several times and I have identified several other revenue sources that have either been hidden, or have not been harnessed the way they should be.
