The World Bank at the weekend said it was planning to increase its funding to Nigeria by $4.5 billion over the next three years to support projects in the power and health industries and in governance, its Vice President for Africa said.

“This is indicative – in the next 18 months or so, we expect to put in place projects for around $2.5 billion,” Hafez Ghanem, said in an interview Thursday in Abuja. “We are thinking about financing more investments in power and the area of social protection.” The bank currently has over 30 projects estimated at $10 billion in Nigeria.

Speaking at an event in Abuja, Ghanem, said, “non-oil tax collection in Nigeria is presently very weak and well below the levels of structural and regional peer countries. Nigeria needs to increase its non-oil revenue collected at both the federal and state levels across the main type of taxes; income, VAT, excises and Customs, and states’ internally generated revenues.”

Source: The Sun