DMO counters bloomberg, says Nigeria not planning to restructure debt

The Debt Management Office (DMO), says contrary to reports by U.S. based financial, software, data and media company, Bloomberg, Nigeria has no plans to restructure its debt.

The DMO said this in a statement on Thursday, against the backdrop of recent reports by Bloomberg that Nigeria was considering restructuring its debt and extending the repayment period of its credit obligations.

The report had quoted Nigeria’s Finance Minister, Mrs Zainab Ahmed, as saying that Nigeria had appointed consultants to advise the government as it faced a rising debt-service burden.

The DMO said that the minister’s statement was taken out of context.

“Over the years, Nigeria’s Debt Management Strategy has always highlighted the need to utilise appropriate debt management tools to streamline the cost and risk profile in the debt portfolio.

“Toward implementation of these strategies, Nigeria has typically availed itself of concessional loans, the spreading out of debt maturities to avoid bounching, and re-profiling of debt maturities by refinancing short-term debt using long-term debt instruments.

“All these, none of which constitute debt restructuring, are already being implemented,” the DMO said.

It said that the Nigerian government was also looking forward to exploring other appropriate debt liability management options such as “bond- buy back” and “bond exchanges”.

“We want to assure local and international investors and creditors that Nigeria remains committed and will meet all its debt obligations, ” the DMO said.