The Yoruba Ronu Forum on Sunday backed Federal Government’s bid to borrow $29.96 billion for implementation of critical projects in the mining, power, health, agricultural, water and educational sectors.
The socio-cultural group said it would not oppose the loan bid if the government assured Nigerians that the money would be used “for purposes intended and properly supervised.”
The Forum’s President, Akin Malaolu, said in a statement that there was a clear need for the loan following years of critical infrastructure neglect.
He said President Muhammadu Buhari could be trusted not to waste the money like the previous governments.
On December 16, the Senate referred Buhari’s loan request under the Federal Government’s 2016 – 2018 External Borrowing Plan, to its Committee on Local and Foreign Debts for further legislative work.
The President in a November 26, 2019 letter said the Eighth National Assembly approved only a part of the External Borrowing Plan loan request forwarded to it in September 2016.
This, according to him, stalled the Federal Government’s implementation of critical projects spanning mining, power, health, agricultural, water and educational sectors.
Malolu suggested that Nigerians’ apprehension about the loan was caused by inadequate information.
He said: “The need for such a loan cannot be overemphasised due to infrastructural neglect over the years. The need to improve on our general infrastructure that has been visited with long years of stunted growth that held the nation down and with the consequence of unemployment everywhere must be recognised.”
According to the Forum, the Buhari administration took the policy of development of infrastructure as its priority, hence the need for such a loan.
