Abuja, April 14, 2025 – Adebayo Adelabu, the Minister of Power, has appealed for more financial support from developed countries to mitigate the negative effects of the sliding crude oil prices.
He said the sliding prices of crude oil would impact negatively on Nigeria’s ability to effectively fund its infrastructure projects.
The minister made the appeal last weekend while receiving the EU Ambassador to Nigeria, Gautier Mignot, in his office in Abuja.
He decried the negative effects of the continuous slide in the price of crude oil, which he said, would affect the nation’s oil revenues.
According to a statement issued by Bolaji Tunji, the Minister Media Assistant, Adelabu said the declining oil prices would necessitate more financial assistance from developed countries to Nigeria.
“We still require lots of financial support as the evolving economic landscape is not so favorable to us in this part of the world, I cannot lie to you. It’s not.
“Just let’s look at the recent disruptions of the reciprocal tariffs from the US and lot of other things that is coming.
“And look at the impact on the crude oil international price from $80 down to $64, and still going down further.
“That’s a lot of risk on our revenues in Africa, especially in Nigeria, where we rely so much on crude oil for foreign exchange.
“Over 90 percent of our foreign revenue is from crude oil. Non-oil export is still very, very low here.
” So, you can see the disruptions is causing to even our 2025 annual budgets.
“We have used $75 to the barrel as the benchmark price for the budget. We have used 2 million barrels per day and we are still on 1.7million.
“You can see that gap, that hole is going to lead to deficit. The major impact is that a lot of our quite laudable infrastructure transformation projects will be affected,” he said.
The minister expressed fears that the government might not have enough resources for capital projects, after paying salaries, pensions, statutory reductions, and service debt.
“In fact, service debt will be a problem. And nobody wants to be insolvent as a sovereign. financing is putting a lot of pressure on us.
“So, I want the Western world to continue to fund us in friendly conditions. Friendly terms that will enable us to want to pay back as soon as we are able to get out of this quagmire.
Responding, Mignot expressed the desire of the EU to continue to collaborate with Nigeria, especially in the power sector, stressing that the energy transition aspect is very important.
“And as you know, we work with grants, work with loans through the EIB in particular. We now have the new important financial stakeholder arriving, which is the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the EBRD.
“And you know that they are extending their mandate to six sub-Saharan African countries, including Nigeria. And Nigeria is becoming a shareholder of the EBRD. Because it’s not only a EU bank.
“We have the majority of member states, but there are many other stakeholders and beneficiary countries are shareholders.
“So, it will also be a new source of financing. They will have an office in Lagos and they are more focused towards private sector than EIB. So, it’s a new asset,” he said.
