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Nigeria has a new $1.08 billion debt on its hands

Apr 07, 2025

Good morning, Big Brains. If you’re not crazy about Monday mornings, that makes both of us. I spent my weekend trying to figure out wh0 did what in The Residence. Now, the fun is over and we’re back to business.

This Week’s Big Question: “If Tinubu, Trump, Peter Obi, and you were the last humans on Earth, who would you kiss, kill, or marry?” Share your responses with us, and if we think they’re fun enough, we’ll feature them in the newsletter :) so be on the lookout.

- Margaret

Word count: ~ 1, 000
Reading time ~ 5 mins

Let’s get into the news you missed during the weekend

Nigeria has a new $1.08 billion debt on its hands
Americans are sick of Trump’s policies

The Big Deal

Nigeria has a new $1.08 billion debt on its hands

We don’t know who Nigerian leaders are taking Finance 101 classes from, but that person is either our biggest opp or the world’s worst teacher.

You should know everything about Nigeria’s growing debt by now, but if you don’t, you need to catch up on previous editions. You’d think Nigeria would hold off on anything debt-related for now, but the Tinubu-led administration is considering a recently approved $1.08 billion World Bank Loan.

Not many Nigerians think this is a bright idea. Organisations like the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) are taking it upon themselves to call on the federal government to reject the loan and focus instead on recovering the ₦233 billion that has gone missing from government agencies.

SERAP also advised President Tinubu to direct Attorney General Lateef Fagbemi and other anti-corruption agencies to investigate allegations of missing, diverted, or unaccounted public funds, including a missing ₦96 billion that can be traced to the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Plc (NBET).

Why is this a big deal?

We’re being polite when we say that Nigeria is a corrupt country. There are more specific words we can use to describe the country but we’ll settle for corrupt.

A 2021 report from the Auditor-General of the Federation’s office confirms that several government agencies, including the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting Company and National Pension Commission, are guilty of financial mismanagement.

This approved loan is supposed to support Nigeria’s electricity sector, but given our track record, there's a good chance it could do the opposite. Instead of fixing power issues, we might just be adding more zeros to the list of unaccounted funds while still sitting in the dark.

This isn’t the first time Nigeria’s electricity sector has requested a huge loan from the World Bank. In May 2024, President Tinubu requested a $500 billion loan, yet the only consistent thing about electricity in Nigeria is that it remains unreliable. If money alone could solve the problem, we’d have uninterrupted power by now. But when funds meant for development keep disappearing into private pockets, all we get is more debt, more excuses, and persistent grid falls.

Speaking of debt, ₦16.3 trillion out of Nigeria’s ₦54.99 trillion budget is going directly to debt servicing.

If you do the basic math in your head, you’ll agree with SERAP. Maybe we shouldn’t be considering such a big loan when we’re still struggling to pay off existing debt. Nations have gone from grace to grass for less, it will take God’s mercy for Nigeria to get out of this mess.

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We can’t say for sure how many presidents have managed to spark nationwide protests just four months into office, but Donald Trump isn’t “many presidents”.

How it started…

Trump’s return to the White House has been controversial as hell. From pausing government programs to imposing aggressive trade tariffs and pushing conservative social policies, he has been busy pissing off Americans.

How it’s going…

Thousands of protesters took to the streets in major U.S. cities on Saturday, April 5. With banners like “No king for USA” and “Get out of my uterus,” it’s clear that Americans are questioning Trump’s style of leadership. Some protesters in London, Paris, and Berlin also joined the movement.

So far, Trump hasn’t acted like he cares about the protests. On Friday, April 4, he doubled down and insisted that his policies would never change.

The next four years will be interesting for Trump and his citizens, and we don’t mean that in a good way.

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