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FG to Create Oil Fund
- By Uchenna Kalu
- Published September 6th, 2009
- EnergyWorld
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The Senate is working on legislation to create a sovereign wealth fund aimed at softening any impact falling oil prices may have on Nigeria’s economy, Mansur Muhtar, Nigeria's finance minister, said last week in Abuja. Muhtar was quoted by Reuters as saying a presidential committee of top Nigerian economic advisers had sent lawmakers a draft proposal for the fund after deliberating on it for more than a year.
The fund could allow a certain percentage of the nation’s revenues to be invested in international markets, providing protection during a downturn in oil prices.
“The senate is now working on the proposals made by the presidential committee with a view to coming out with a legislation that will guide and empower the government in setting up the fund,” Muhtar told the news agency in an interview.
Nigeria’s economy still depends largely on the rise and fall of volatile oil markets, which have traded between $100 and $34 in the past 12 months. Africa’s most populous country depends on oil and gas income for more than 80 per cent of its revenues.
But the idea of public money being invested overseas has sparked some concerns in a country struggling with power outages, decrepit roads and underfunded hospitals and schools.
“The senate committee raised some issues on it recently, especially on the legal framework. We addressed and resolved it,” Muhtar told Reuters.
Standard Bank last year estimated the Nigerian government received a nominal $436 billion in direct hydrocarbon revenues and taxes between 1970 and 2007, which is the equivalent of about $1.2 trillion today.
The fund could allow a certain percentage of the nation’s revenues to be invested in international markets, providing protection during a downturn in oil prices.
“The senate is now working on the proposals made by the presidential committee with a view to coming out with a legislation that will guide and empower the government in setting up the fund,” Muhtar told the news agency in an interview.
Nigeria’s economy still depends largely on the rise and fall of volatile oil markets, which have traded between $100 and $34 in the past 12 months. Africa’s most populous country depends on oil and gas income for more than 80 per cent of its revenues.
But the idea of public money being invested overseas has sparked some concerns in a country struggling with power outages, decrepit roads and underfunded hospitals and schools.
“The senate committee raised some issues on it recently, especially on the legal framework. We addressed and resolved it,” Muhtar told Reuters.
Standard Bank last year estimated the Nigerian government received a nominal $436 billion in direct hydrocarbon revenues and taxes between 1970 and 2007, which is the equivalent of about $1.2 trillion today.
