An Appraisal of the Impact of Public Debt Management on the Performance of Nigeria’s Economy

Abstract

The study analysed the impact of public debt management on the performance of the Nigerian economy. The ex post facto research design was adopted in the study and data were gathered from secondary sources. These data were time series data obtained from Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Statistical Bulletin, the Debt Management Office (DMO) Annual Debt Reports, and World Bank Database. The researchers employed different econometric tools to analyze the data. These include ADF unit root test, Johansen co-integration test, Bivariate multicollinearity analysis and regression analysis, with the use of the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) technique. The empirical results indicated that external debt and debt service payments negatively affected both economic growth and development in Nigeria while domestic debt had positive effect. Therefore, the researchers recommended that the Federal Government of Nigeria should encourage fiscal reforms that boost domestic revenue generation by broadening the revenue base, improving the capacity to tax, and curtailing unproductive government expenditures, as this will help curtail the government's propensity to borrow and reduce the ever increasing debt profile of Nigeria.

Keywords

References