Nigeria gets another $200 million loan

African Development Bank Group and the Africa Growing Together
Fund, AGTF, on Monday, granted the sum of $200 million loan to
Nigeria for the funding of the country’s Electrification Project,
NEP.

Daily Nigerian reports that while AfDB group loaned $150 million
for the project, balance of $50 million was issued from the AGTF, a
US$2 billion facility sponsored by the People’s Bank of China.

“The Board of Directors of the African Development Bank Group
has approved a US$150 million sovereign loan to the Federal
Government of Nigeria to finance the Nigeria Electrification
Project (NEP),” AfDB said in a statement.

“The Africa Growing Together Fund, AGTF, a US$2 billion facility
sponsored by the People’s Bank of China and administered by the
African Development Bank, has also approved a US$ 50 Million Loan
to the Federal Government of Nigeria to co-finance the
project.”

According to the finance institute, the joint financing is
targeted at supporting the federal government efforts “to address
critical energy access deficit in the country, and catalyze
achievement of universal energy access by 2030 targets.”

In 2017, the World Bank approved a sum of $350 million loan to
Nigeria for the development of rural electrification projects in
the country.

About 80 million people in Nigeria have no access to
electricity, while about 600 million people in sub-Saharan Africa
do not have power supply in their various communities.

“By supporting the electrification of unconnected and
underserved communities, NEP will contribute materially to their
economic development,” said the managing director of the Rural
Electrification Agency, Damilola Ogunbiyi.

“Access to reliable, affordable and clean electricity will
result in savings for households and businesses, which can be
deployed to other uses.”

The federal government has said it would by 2020, generate up to
3,000 megawatts (MW) of electricity with about 10,000 mini-grid
projects to electrify communities in the country that are yet to
get connected to the national grid.

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