The Debt Management Office (DMO) has established a domestic debt market as alternative source of borrowing for both government and the organised private sector.

Mr. Abraham Nwankwo, Director-general of the DMO made this known in Abuja on Wednesday when Prof. Chudi Uwazuruike, member of the House of Representatives, representing Ehime-Mbano Federal Constituency in Imo paid him a courtesy visit.

We took a decision to focus on developing the domestic debt market for a number of reasons; first of all was so that government could have an alternative source of funding if it must borrow, let it not be constrained to borrow from external sources only, let  it have a choice .

We thought that was important to have a long-term for government to have a choice not to rely only on external borrowing.

“The second is that we wanted also to develop the domestic market so that other stakeholders that are not government, particularly the “corporates” could also borrow long-term from this market for the purpose of developing the real sector of the economy and infrastructure.”

According to him, though Nigeria has some external debt it is managing, there will still be the need to borrow from appropriate sources for long-term development of the country.

“So by developing a market where government can issue bonds  just like where private companies issue debentures, government will be subjected to the discipline of the market,” he added.

Commenting on the bond market, Nwankwo said that as at 2003, there was no market for long-term   funding in the country, but noted that since 2003 till date, the DMO had been able to resuscitate the bond market

“We have been able to resuscitate the market in such a way that we have established three-year, five-year, and seven-year and 10-year bonds. By November 2008, we issued 20-year bonds in the Nigerian market,” he said.

He added that both government and the private sector could now buy bonds in the capital market, adding that efforts had been made to strength the secondary debt instrument to make the market more liquid.

He added that in January, Nigeria issued five million dollars at the international capital market for Nigeria to register its presence at the international level.

Responding, Uwazuruike commended the effort of the office and urged it to continue to ensure that its efforts were directed at strengthening the nation’s economy.

He said that there was the need to deepen the nation’s economy and ensure improved living standard of the people. He said: “Nigeria has come a long way and I am convinced that with the emergence of technocrats and sound managers in our economic sector, it will bring positive change.

“I am happy that we have listening leaders now because if we don’t have them, all efforts of the technocrats will not work and there will be no economic growth”.

Uwazuruike commended the DMO for ensuring that debt management departments were established across the 36 states of the federation saying “If DMO is standing and working effectively, I will say that Nigeria is moving on.”