By Dipo Olowookere
About N400 billion has been released into the economy by the Federal Government through the Debt Management Office (DMO) to provide liquidity in the system and also to service the nation’s debts.
Director General of the DMO, Ms Patience Oniha, made this disclosure last Friday at the 2nd Vanguard Economic Discourse held in Lagos.
Ms Oniha said the interventions have yielded the needed results, leaving the economy a bit healthier than in 2016, when the nation fell into recession.
The debt office chief disclosed that the fund released into the economy was government’s strategy to reduce its debt profile and interest rate on its lending from 18 percent to 14 percent.
According to her, this would improve the ability of financial institutions to lend to the real sector.
However, she wondered why the benefits of government’s reduced borrowing through the funds released from December till date were not reflected in increased funding of the real sector.
She said there was an urgent need for reforms on population, infrastructure development, and scaling up actions to meet the expectations of the citizens.
MS Oniha said government will continue to support the economy and give more opportunities to the real sector to enable them grow.
The 2nd Vanguard Economic Discourse was themed ‘Economy in Rebound: Pitfalls, Trajectories and Resetting’ and was attended by experts drawn from different sectors.
Adedapo Adesanya 
Modupe Gbadeyanka