Senate President Godswill Akpabio has revealed that the ongoing conflict involving the United States, Israel, and Iran directly derailed Nigeria’s plan to secure a $5 billion loan from the United Arab Emirates, forcing the federal government to pivot urgently to an alternative lender to prevent critical infrastructure projects from stalling.
Akpabio made the disclosure during Senate plenary as the upper chamber considered and approved President Bola Tinubu’s $516.3 million loan request from Deutsche Bank AG for the Sokoto to Badagry Superhighway, explaining that geopolitical disruptions in the Middle East had made the originally planned Abu Dhabi Bank borrowing arrangement inaccessible.
He said the Senate’s swift approval of the Deutsche Bank facility was driven by the pressing need to keep strategic national infrastructure projects on track rather than allow them to be abandoned due to financing uncertainties created by the global energy crisis.
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Insurance and Other Financial Institutions, Senator Adetokunbo Abiru, corroborated Akpabio’s account, similarly highlighting the challenges the Tinubu administration had encountered in accessing the planned UAE facility. Tinubu had written to the Senate in March seeking approval to borrow the $5 billion to finance the 2026 budget deficit and support other critical national obligations.
With the UAE loan blocked by the geopolitical situation, the federal government secured the $516.3 million syndicated loan from Deutsche Bank, backed by a partial risk guarantee from the Islamic Corporation for the Insurance of Investment and Export Credit, an arm of the Islamic Development Bank, as part of a broader infrastructure financing strategy.
Tinubu, in his communication to the Senate, stated that the federal government would provide N265.5 billion as counterpart funding for land acquisition, compensation, and ancillary infrastructure. He explained that the highway, spanning approximately 1,000 kilometres from Illela in Sokoto State to Badagry in Lagos State through seven states, was designed to open up the northwest to southwest economic corridor, enhance connectivity, reduce logistics costs, improve road safety, facilitate trade, and strengthen food security while promoting national integration.
The Senate approved the facility following the adoption of a report from its Committee on Local and Foreign Debts, chaired by Senator Aliyu Wamakko. Several senators, including Deputy Senate President Barau Jibrin and Chief Whip Mohammed Monguno, commended the administration for pursuing strategic infrastructure investment despite prevailing global economic uncertainty.
