Posted by ACHILLEUS UCHEGBU on
SENATE President, Chief Ken Nnamani, has denied an earlier statement allegedly credited to him, accusing President Olusegun Obasanjo of making the country indebted through a $1 billion loan he took as military head of state.
SENATE President, Chief Ken Nnamani, has denied an earlier statement allegedly credited to him, accusing President Olusegun Obasanjo of making the country indebted through a $1 billion loan he took as military head of state.
Distancing himself from the position, the Senate President, through his special assistant on Public Communication, Mr. Augsten Adamu, said the statement was erroneously attributed to him.
A statement made available to Daily Champion, said though the Senate President's aide was at the event where the comment was made, he did not blame President Obasanjo for laying the foundation for Nigeria's huge foreign debt profile.
According to the statement, Dr. Nwinee, an aide to the Senate President who spoke at the event encouraged the civil society to collaborate more with government in the pursuit of economic and social development and also in the empowerment of people.
It also said the offending position on debt was made by country director of Action Aid International Nigeria, Dr. Otive Igbuzor, who was chairman at the occasion.
In his presentation, at the one- day conference on poverty organized by Global Call to Action Against Poverty in Nigeria, entitled, "The challenge of Africa's debt burden", Dr. Igbuzor said: "Obasanjo with a great desire to develop this nation at a speed above the level we can cope with and lack of prudent financial management as well as the projection that petrol money would continue to pump in, into Nigeria took a loan of $1 billion from the international capital market".
He further said that "this loan increased Nigeria's external loan from the million dollars group into the billion group. With a huge urge for debt, he went further to take more loans so that Nigeria's external loan increased from N496.9 million in 1977 to N1.6115 billion as at when he handed over power".
"The economic adviser to the Senate President did not blame President Obasanjo for money borrowed in the past, nor did he make any comment whatsoever on Nigeria's external loans and debt profile, Adamu said in his statement.