The Federal Executive Council (FEC) on Wednesday at its meeting in Abuja approved the appointment of six Transaction Parties for the one billion Eurobond programme.
The Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, disclosed this when she briefed State House correspondents on the outcome of the meeting, which was presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari.
The Eurobond is part of the country’s plans to borrow a total of N1.8trillion ($5.8bn) from abroad and locally to fund an expected budget deficit of N2.2trillion this year.
The Eurobond is the first tranche of a 4.5 billion dollars Nigeria Global Medium-Term Notes Issuance Programme that runs through 2016 to 2018.
According to the minister, the $1billion Eurobond programme is part of the funding for the 2016 budget which will commence in January, 2017.
She said the approved managers of the Eurobond included, Citi Groups, Standard Chartered Bank, Stanbic IBTC, Africa Practice Communications Advisors and two others
“The one billion Eurobond programme is part of the funding for the 2016 budget and we hope to be able to commence that process in January.
“We obtained a Certificate of No Objection from BPP for the appointment of those parties having undertaken a fully competitive open tender process.
“We are confident that we will be able to complete these transactions expediently.
“There’s already significant interest and the oil price stability is helping us.
“Currently, there is quite a bit of demand for emerging market paper. Nigeria’s paper is trading around 7 to 8 per cent mark.’’
According to her, Nigeria is expected to get a competitive pricing on the issuance programme which will be used for the purpose of funding capital projects as part of the 2016 budget.
She announced that the managers of the Eurobond would also be running any Eurobond issuance programme for the next three years.
“The other thing to note is that these parties that have been appointed would run any Eurobond issuance programme that we do for the next three years so that we don’t have to keep on re-tendering unless there is a major problem with any of them they will be our parties for the next three years,’’ she said.
Also addressing the correspondents, the Minister of Environment, Mrs Amina Mohammed, revealed that the council deliberated on the amendment to the Gazette of the establishment of Hydrocarbon Pollution Restoration Project.
The minister noted that the amendment had become necessary in view of the fact that the old Gazette did not put in place some of the governing structure like the board of trustees and governing board, which could be accountable for the implementation of UN Reports on Environment.
She said the move would give the needed legal backing for the cleanup exercise in the Niger-Delta region, beginning with the Ogoniland.
“The memo I took to Council was to finalise the amendments to the Gazette for the establishment of the Hydrocarbon Pollution Restoration Project (HYPREP), which is the vehicle that is supposed to house all the governing structures to allow us to do the clean-up in the Niger-Delta, beginning with the Ogoniland and the implementation of the UNEP Reports.
“What we have seen in past, the past gazette did not put in place some of the governing structure we need like the governing board; like the board of trustees or a structure that will be held accountable for the enormous amount of money that is already available to spend.’’