Babajide Ogunsanwo, a data analyst, has picked holes in Nigeria’s N149.39 trillion debt figure as of the first quarter of 2025.
Ogunsanwo lamented that the challenge with the country’s debt is that there is no commensurate return or results on the debt, either tangibly or intangibly.
He made this known during his analysis on Channels Television on Sunday.
Ogunsanwo stressed that the focus of Nigerians and the Debt Management Office should be on what the results are from the acquired N149.39 trillion debt over the past years.
According to him, nothing weakens a country like the poor use of loans.
He added that a major headache with Nigeria’s Q1 2025 debt figure is domestic borrowing, which grew by N50 trillion in the last two years under Tinubu.
“The challenge we have is that we are focused on the cost of debt without really matching it to what we are getting in return from this debt.
“Nothing really weakens the government as much as the poor use of debt. Over the years, we have been talking about the cost of debt; the conversation we should be having now is: what exactly are the returns on the debt? Whenever we see the Debt Management Office talking about debt service, we have to elevate our discussion to include what the returns and results on this debt are — the tangible or intangible returns,” he said.
Ogunsanwo added, “The real headache is domestic borrowing; the Federal Government under Tinubu has acquired 50 trillion in two years.”
His comments come as the Debt Management Office recently released Nigeria’s Q1 2025 figures, which stood at N149.39 trillion.
The figure showed a quarter-on-quarter increase of N4.72 trillion, or 3.3 percent, from N144.67 trillion as of December 31, 2024.
A further breakdown indicates that domestic debt grew by 203 percent to N74.8 trillion in Q1 2025 from N23.7 trillion in the same quarter of 2023.
Also, foreign debt increased by 11 percent to $41 billion in Q1 2025 from $37 billion in Q1 2023.
