The governors of 28 states who are leaving office on May 29 or running for re-election and the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory have piled up about N5.8tn sub-national debts amid an economic crunch.
The debt figures were based on an analysis of the sub-national debts reports by the Debt Management Office
They include Governors Mohammed Yahaya of Gombe; Babagana Zulum (Borno); Abdullahi Sule (Nasarawa); Seyi Makinde (Oyo); Mai Buni (Yobe); Bello Matawalle (Zamfara); Babajide Sanwo-Olu (Lagos); Ahmadu Fintiri (Adamawa); Dapo Abiodun (Ogun); Bala Mohammed (Bauchi) and Abdulrahman Abdulrazak of Kwara state.
Those that will not be seeking re-elections are Emannuel Udom (Akwa Ibom); Samuel Ortom (Benue) Ifeanyi Okowa (Delta); David Umahi (Ebonyi); Mohammed Abubakar (Gombe) Aminu Masari (Katsina); Bello Bagudu (Kebbi); Abubakar Bello (Niger); Aminu Tambuwal (Sokoto); Simon Lalong (Plateau) and Darius Ishaku of Taraba.
Other governors that are not seeking re-election include the Kaduna State Governor, Nasiru El-rufai; Abdulahi Ganduje (Kano); Victor Ikpeazu (Abia); Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi (Enugu); Ben Ayade( Cross Rivers) and Nyesome Wike of Rivers.
The sub-national debts are classified into domestic-borrowings from local creditors and external-borrowings from foreign or international creditors like the World Bank.
The domestic and external debts published on the DMO’s website were as of September 30 and June 30, 2022, respectively.
According to the reports, sub-national domestic debts were about N4.38tn while their external debts were about $3.15bn or N1.42tn based on the exchange rate of the Central Bank of Nigeria of N449.53 to a dollar as of Thursday.
The data further shows that Lagos has the highest debt, with N877.04bn domestic debt and $1.27bn foreign debt.
It is followed by Kaduna, with a domestic debt of N86.86bn and external debt of $586.78m.
The third highest debt is Rivers, with a domestic debt of N225.51bn and foreign debt of $140.18m.
