- Depletes Foreign Reserves By $ 3 billion
By Abiola Olawale
Nigeria’s foreign debt repayment obligations surged by 50% year-on-year, with the federal government disbursing $2.01 billion between January and April 2025, compared to $1.33 billion in the same period of 2024, according to the latest data from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
The latest CBN’s data showed that this sharp increase was driven by significant repayments to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Eurobond dues by the federal government.
The apex bank also disclosed that the debt repayment has intensified pressure on the nation’s dwindling foreign exchange reserves, which dropped by approximately $3 billion during the review period.
According to the report, debt servicing alone accounted for 77.1 per cent of Nigeria’s total international payments within the four months, a sharp rise from the 64.5 per cent share recorded in the same period of 2024.
In total, the country’s international payments, comprising debt service, remittances, and letters of credit, stood at $2.60bn as of April 2025, up from $2.07bn recorded in the corresponding period of 2024.
The CBN statistics also underlined a dramatic rise in April 2025, with $557.79 million repaid—a staggering 159% increase from the $215.20 million paid in April 2024.
Similarly, in March the Federal government paid $632.36m, which more than doubled the $276.17m paid in the same month last year.
In January 2025, Nigeria paid $540.67m from $560.52m recorded in January 2024.
In February, the figure stood at $276.73m, almost without a change from the $283.22m paid in February 2024.
Further breakdown indicated that a staggering nearly $1.2 billion was spent on debt repayments in March and April alone.
The country spent nearly $1.2bn on debt repayments within March and April alone, the data revealed.
This shocking development follows confirmation by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that Nigeria had fully repaid the $3.4bn financial support it received under the Rapid Financing Instrument to cushion the economic impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The loan is one of the largest disbursements under the Rapid Financing Instrument globally and came with relatively favourable terms compared to traditional IMF programmes.
In a statement on behalf of the IMF Resident Representative for Nigeria, Christian Ebeke, the Fund said the repayment was completed on April 30, 2025.
IMF stated that “As of April 30, 2025, Nigeria has fully repaid the financial support of about $3.4bn it requested and received in April 2020 from the International Monetary Fund under the Rapid Financing Instrument to help alleviate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the sharp fall in oil prices.”
The loan, disbursed in April 2020, was devoted to helping Nigeria address a sharp fall in oil prices, economic contraction, and fiscal pressures caused by the pandemic.
Despite full repayment of the principal, Nigeria will continue to pay additional annual fees related to Special Drawing Rights charges of about $30m over the next few years.
According to the IMF the charges are tied to the differentials between Nigeria’s SDR holdings, which currently stand at SDR 3,164m ($4.3bn), and its cumulative SDR allocation of SDR 4,027m ($5.5bn). The IMF further stated that the charges are levied at the SDR interest rate, which is updated weekly, and will continue until Nigeria’s SDR holdings match the cumulative allocation amount.
