FRI SEPT 25 2026-theGBJournal| Former Anambra State governor Peter Obi has challenged the state government’s description of US$123.77 million in multilateral development financing as debt he left behind, saying official debt records showed the state’s external obligations were far lower when he handed over power in 2014.
Obi, currently NDC Presidential candidate for 2027 election, said in a statement today, that the Anambra State government had conflated the total value of several multilateral development programmes with the amount actually drawn and the balance outstanding at the time he left office.
He said the distinction was crucial to understanding the state’s finances.
“The government has combined these distinct categories, added them together, and described the resulting US$123.77 million as ‘loans left by Peter Obi’.
“That is an incorrect application of public-sector accounting,” he said.
Obi governed Anambra from 2006 to 2013, returning briefly to office in 2014 before handing over on March 17.
He said he had not borrowed from financial institutions or issued a bond on behalf of the state during his tenure.
As evidence, he referred to comments made by then Director-General of Nigeria’s Debt Management Office, Abraham Nwankwo, who, according to Obi, described him at his farewell ceremony as the only governor during Nwankwo’s 10-year tenure who had not approached the DMO for a loan facility.
Obi also said that when he left office, Anambra had no unpaid salaries, pensions or gratuities, and owed no contractor or supplier whose completed work had been verified and certified by the government.
Obi said the financing in question largely involved World Bank and International Fund for Agricultural Development programmes negotiated by the Federal Government, with participating states accessing the funds through subsidiary arrangements.
”These are concessionary development-support funds secured by the Federal Government for states selected by it to address specific needs. Repayment is spread over 25 to 30 years,” he noted.
But he acknowledged that Anambra had repayment obligations under the programmes.
“This does not suggest that Anambra had no repayment responsibilities; rather, each facility must be examined in light of its approval, effectiveness, drawdown, and repayment record.
In clarifying, Obi said, ”The clearest contradiction appears in the government’s own figures.
It states that the original facilities amounted to approximately US$123.77 million and that US$92.35 million remained outstanding in June 2026.
However, the DMO’s published records showed Anambra’s total external debt at approximately US$18 million when I began my tenure in March 2006, about US$30 million in March 2014, when I left office, and approximately US$45.15 million as of 31 December 2014, nine months after my departure.
The Anambra State Government must therefore clarify how a state whose recorded external debt was about US$30 million in March 2014 and US$45.15 million in December 2014 could supposedly have inherited US$123.77 million from Peter Obi, who left office in March of that same year.”
Obi’s intervention comes amid a wider political dispute over Anambra’s finances, but he sought to frame his response as a question of accounting rather than a personal confrontation with Governor Chukwuma Soludo.
He said he had no disagreement with Soludo or any other governor and stressed that he was not seeking a return to the Anambra governorship.
For Obi, the different stages of development financing — approval, effectiveness, drawdown and repayment — should not be treated as the same figure when calculating the debt inherited by a government.
Obi says those figures need to be separated before any conclusion can be drawn about the debt he left behind.
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