Some economists have advised the Federal
Government to check the country’s rising debt profile to save the
private sector from further job losses.
They told the News Agency of Nigeria in Lagos on Wednesday that the rising debt stock could retard development and cause more hardship to the people.
The Director-General, Lagos Chamber of
Commerce and Industry, Mr. Muda Yusuf, said the nation’s domestic debt
stock was more disturbing than the external debt.
Yusuf said the government might not be
in a position to execute projects to aid the growth of the private
sector if the rising debt stock was not checked.
According to him, the increase in the
domestic debt will make it difficult for the private sector to access
credit to import raw materials.
He said that the cost of servicing debts was too high, even when other sectors were not well funded.
“The rate at which the Federal
Government is borrowing is high and no country can develop with high
interest rates on loans,” he said.
The General Manager, True Bond
Microfinance Bank, Mr. Wole Olowu, advised the government to rationalise
its structures, stressing that some agencies were performing same
functions.
He also urged the government to tackle
the problem of ghost workers in the public service to reduce the debt
profile drastically.
“The government is losing huge money through this medium, which can be used to finance other sectors of the economy,” he said.
Olowu said the problem of inflated contracts must also be tackled, alleging that majority of contracts were over-bloated.
A Senior Lecturer in the Department of
Economics, University of Lagos, Dr. Kazzem Bello, said excessive
borrowing would not bring about national development, but would rather
inflict poverty on the people.
He advised the government to drastically reduce its recurrent expenditure to enable it save funds to execute capital projects.
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