By Francis Ogwo
In view of Nigeria’s huge financial needs in fighting the economic misfortunes caused by COVID-19, the World Bank is expected to make a decision in late July on a $1.5 billion loan
According to a Reuters report, the bank’s country director said, “The World Bank is working on packages that could provide more than $3bn to Africa’s largest economy, which is facing what the lender says may be its greatest fiscal crisis in 40 years, set off by the Coronavirus pandemic and resulting oil price crash.
“We were hoping to present to our board, by late July or latest early August, because the government will need the finance,” Shubham Chaudhuri, its Nigeria country director, told Reuters.
“The immediate challenge is a fiscal one: How does the government marshal the fiscal resources to keep basic government functions going?” Chaudhuri said.
Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed, had recently said the economy could shrink as much as 8.9% in 2020 and the World Bank had predicted Nigeria’s economy to shrink by between 3.2% and 8% in 2020, with government oil revenue falling by a third or possibly more than half.
Reports say Nigeria’s 2016 recession rendered 13 million people unemployed, and the crisis would be “much more pronounced with World Bank loans like the $1.5bn often having conditions attached to them.”
