Tinubu seeks NASS’s approval for $516m highway loan

Nigerian President Bola Tinubu has asked parliament to approve a $516 million foreign loan to help finance the ‌first sections of a new national highway, a major transport corridor linking the country’s northwest to its southwest.

In a letter read by the Senate’s president during a plenary session on Thursday, Tinubu said the government was seeking approval for the syndicated financing facility from Deutsche Bank, adding the loan was part of the government’s medium-term borrowing plan approved by lawmakers.

The loan would have a nine-year tenor, including up to three years’ grace, Tinubu said in the letter.

The ‌roughly 1,000-km (600-mile) highway will link Sokoto state, in Nigeria’s northwest, through the central Niger and Kwara states to the coastal town of Badagry in Lagos, the commercial capital.

Tinubu said the highway would deepen north–south links, cut travel times and haulage costs, lift trade and food security, and bolster national integration.

Last year, Nigeria raised a $747 million syndicated loan, led by Deutsche Bank, to fund the first phase of a planned 700-km (435-mile) coastal highway.