Press Statement
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) alarms that with the volume of
foreign loans being accumulated by President Muhammadu Buhari and his
All Progressives Congress (APC), our nation and her people have been
placed on the international auction market.
The party said President Buhari’s moves to take a fresh $5.513 billion
(N2.1 trillion) loan in addition to an earlier $22.79 billion
(N8.5trillion), the size of 2020 budget, without operable repayment
plans, will totally compromise the fiscal integrity of our nation and
open her up for economic annexation by foreign creditors. This is in
addition to N850 billion from the capital market.
It is more alarming that the Buhari government, in this fiscal year,
cannot muster the capacity to harness the huge resources available in
our country to generate even half of the sum of its own budget, but has
been going cap in hands to shop for foreign loans.
The PDP expressed fears that with this situation, the APC administration
is practically driving our nation to the brinks while exposing Nigerians
to the risk of modern day slavery by mortgaging our future to economic
appropriation by foreign interests.
Already the situation has created apprehensions, anxiety and trepidation
among the citizens, particularly the youths, who are now scared about
their future and the survival of our nation under the APC.
It is even more distressing that this administration cannot account for
the loans it has taken so far. In spite of the deluge of loans, the
lives of the ordinary Nigerians, on whose behalf they claim to be
amassing these debts, have become worse than the APC and Buhari met them
in 2015.
Painfully, even the savings made by previous administrations have been
opened up for pillaging by APC leaders and the cabal in the Buhari
Presidency
The PDP calls on Nigerians to look beyond our primordial differences and
unite in speaking against this accumulation of debts. It is no longer
about political party affiliations, creed, ethnicity, class or age. We
all must unite in one voice to save our nation from an imminent
collapse.
Our party holds that rather than mortgaging our nation to foreign
interests, President Buhari should immediately cut the size of his
government, slash its over bloated budget, clip its luxuries, curb
unbridled corruption in his administration and make haste to recover the
N14 trillion that was stolen by APC leaders under his watch.
If the N14 trillion stashed away by APC leaders and the cabal is
recovered, our nation will not be in need of these humongous foreign
loans.
The PDP also urges the National Assembly to stand on the side of the
people and save the nation by immediately using its legislative
instrument to check this unbridled appetite for foreign loans.
Signed:
Kola Ologbondiyan
National Publicity Secretary
