Afreximbank Disburses $50bn to Nigeria in 19 Years

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Africa Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) disbursed $50 billion for the execution of various projects in Nigeria in the last 19 years, the President of the Cairo-based lender, Mr Benedict Oramah, disclosed at the commissioning of the Afreximbank Africa Trade Centre (AATC) in Abuja.

At the event, he also reaffirmed the bank’s vision to dismantle trade barriers and promote African market integration.

“Over the last decade alone, total disbursements into Nigeria amounted to about 50 billion US dollars, spreading across vital sectors of energy, infrastructure, manufacturing, healthcare, transport and financial services.

“Our support to the Nigerian financial services industry, amounting to 19 billion US dollars in the last decade, has helped to deepen and expand the sector and elevated their impact on the local economy,” he stated.

The Afreximbank president, who hinted at the establishment of other AATCs in Harare, Kampala, Cairo, and Yaoundé, described the relationship between the bank and Nigeria as mutually beneficial.

“Over the last three decades, successive governments have accorded unflinching support to Afreximbank, responding most positively to capital calls, creating a congenial environment for its smooth operations while providing the Bank significant domestic policy support that helped to execute many of the development programmes in Nigeria.”

Mr Oramah pledged to expand the influence of the Africa Export-Import Bank across the Atlantic, with AATCs in the Caribbean, adding: “We must reshape our future.”

“We mark the standing up of an edifice that defiantly roars: that we must reshape our future; that we can no longer be hostages to a colonial legacy deeply rooted on ‘divide-and-conquer’ — a legacy that makes Africans regard their colonisers as masters and brothers and sisters, as enemies, and even aliens,” he said of the commissioning of the Abuja AATC.