FG Approves $1.3bn Loan For Development Bank

This was disclosed by the Minister of Finance, Kemi Adesoun, after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa.

According to her, the money will be sourced from the World Bank, African Development Bank, French Development Agency and a German-owned KFW Development Bank.

She said, “The other memo was an approval for credit facilities totalling $1.3billion to support the Development Bank of Nigeria. As you know, the Development Bank of Nigeria recently received its licence and is being funded by some long term loans from some of our development partners.

“So, the World Bank had given us $500million repayable over 21 years and all of this is at concessional rate.The African Development Bank is giving us $450million and KFW is giving us $200million and the French Development Agency is giving us $130million.

“To access this money, we are ready to disburse but there were two requirements that we need to make and one of them is the legal opinion by the Attorney General of the Federation and the other is the National Assembly approval.”

She also pointed out that, with the approval by FEC, the request will now be forwarded to the National Assembly for final legislative endorsement and that the credit will aid the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises over much longer periods at much lower rates.

“Before it goes to the National Assembly, it needs to be approved by FEC and FEC simply approved today that these loan requests should go to the National Assembly for approval so we can access this money and the Development Bank of Nigeria can take off fully as it is expected to transform Financing of our MSME sector” she said.