Data from the Debt Management Office (DMO) shows that under President Muhammadu Buhari’s leadership, Nigeria’s debt to China has risen by a startling 209 percent.
The government owed China $4.29 billion as of December 2022, up from $1.39 billion in June 2015, according to the office.
According to the data study, China was responsible for 84.73 percent of Nigeria’s bilateral debt, with the remaining amounts coming from France, Japan, India, and Germany.
DMO added that the loans from China had a concessionary interest rate of 2.50 percent per year, a 20-year term, and a seven-year grace period (moratorium).
Under pressure from the United States, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank, China has stated that it is willing to listen to Nigeria and other nations that are burdened by its debt.
Before a judgment can be taken, the enormous Asian nation has made a number of demands.
Bloomberg reported that at the last Global Sovereign Debt Roundtable in the US, a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry recommended three conditions before a decision will be made.
The first is that multilateral creditors, such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, must find solutions as quickly as feasible for their involvement in debt treatment.
Second, the IMF has to start releasing data on evaluations of debt sustainability as soon as practicable. The third requirement is for the parties to quickly come to an agreement on how exactly creditors will participate on comparable conditions.
He did not, however, provide a timetable for when the debt restructuring will start.
