Posted by By Paul Ibe, Abuja on
The gains of the debt relief granted the country yesterday by the Paris Club will be deployed to key areas of rural electrification, roads, water supply, agriculture, education and health, Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has said.
The gains of the debt relief granted the country yesterday by the Paris Club will be deployed to key areas of rural electrification, roads, water supply, agriculture, education and health, Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has said.
The Minister, who spoke to a select group of journalists in Abuja yesterday assured that the gains would be ploughed back into the poverty development strategies and programme of the government.
"It means that the $1 billion that we used to pay to the Paris Club, once we get this deal concluded and starting from 2006, we would not have to pay them that $1 billion, but to factor it into key poverty reducing areas or key basic service areas," the minister said in response to a question on what impact the debt relief would have for Nigerians.
"Most people think and we agree that power in this country including rural electrification, roads, water supply, agriculture, education and health are areas that are important. We intend to put this money into those areas that I mentioned," an obviously elated Okonjo-Iweala said.
According to her, one of the key areas that the government would deploy funds from the gains of debt relief is power generation and transmission in order to boost the productive sector.
"When we put that money that we would have used for debt service from next year into more infrastructural
development, that means that the manufacturing sector (if we build more power plants and transmission lines) would have some of their costs reduced. Those welders and artisans in such places as Ariaria Market (in Aba, Abia State), for example, are going to have power to run their machines. For these reasons, we are going to keep to the path that we are on and we are not going to relent," she assured.
She disclosed that the Federal Government is developing a system to track expenditures in those key areas "so that Nigerians can follow how this money is applied, to know if it is being well spent or not." she said the
Department For International Development (DFID) and the World Bank are supporting the development of the system for which President Olusegun Obasanjo has nominated Mrs. Amina Ibrahim, a Senior Special Assistant to oversee this sector.
Also, the minister said the President, as part of that initiative, had on Wednesday inaugurated Millennium Development Goal (MDG) Tracking Commission Wednesday.
"That is very necessary and it is to oversee the work that is going to be produced from this tracking on a quarterly basis. We would report to this commission to see how we are doing and Nigerians would be able to hear and see what we are doing. We are taking it very seriously because we don't want people to say that the relief we got in terms of that money we would have been paying for debt servicing where is it?
"We are setting up processes even ahead of the actual deal being concluded to make sure that when it is done, people can see what we are doing with the incremental money," she said.
She dispelled fears that the reform was undertaken to achieve debt relief.
"I want to assure Nigerians that if we were doing these reforms just for debt relief, I don't think that we will be where we are today. We would have abandoned it by now because it has not been an easy process," she said.
The Finance Minister, who was until her appointment a World Bank Vice President, said the overall goal of the reform is "to change the way our country is structured so that we can become a more modern economy.
"We all know that it entails some pain in the beginning. We are now beginning to see the gain in this debt relief. $18 billion nearly close to $20 billion is no small feat. We are going to maintain the reform because we believe that it is going to continue to yield this dividend for the economy," she added.
And to ensure that the process is not reversed, the minister said there now exist laws that restrict foreign borrowings.