FG borrows $2.1bn from World Bank

The Federal Government has obtained a sum of $2.1 billion credit from the World Bank to rebuild the North-East zone devastated by terror group, Boko Haram.

This was announced in a statement released by the Special Adviser to President Buhari on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina.

Mr Adesina said the announcement was made in Washington DC, United States, on Wednesday during a meeting that President Muhammadu Buhari had with representatives of the World Bank, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the World Health Organization.

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The statement read in part, “The President urged the World Bank to send a team, which would work in concert with a team from the Federal Government, so that a proper assessment of needs could be done.
 

“The World Bank will spend $2.1bn through its International Development Agency, which gives low interest rate loans to governments. The first 10 years will be interest-free, while (the interest for the) additional 30 years will be at lower than the capital market rate.
“The World Bank is eager to move in quickly, give out the loans and give succour to the people of the North-East, long at the mercy of an insurgency that has claimed over 20,000 souls.”

The statement further read that WHO would also invest $300m in immunization against malaria in Nigeria, while the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation would collaborate with the Dangote Foundation to ensure that the country maintained its zero polio case record of the past one year.

If the efforts are sustained for another two years, the presidential spokesman said Nigeria would be declared fully free of polio.

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Buhari said priority must be given to the resettlement of people who have been displaced internally as a result of the activities of the Boko Haram sect in the North-East.

Adesina quoted the President as saying that apart from rebuilding the affected region in terms of infrastructure, priority must also be given to the Internally Displaced Persons who are now over a million.

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