The Impact of Nigeria’s Debt Stock and its Servicing on Social Services Provision: 1980-2010

Abstract

Public expenditure financing using internal or external debt strategy is often the norm in most countries, Nigeria inclusive. The main objective of this study is to investigate the causality between debt service payments and provision of social services in Nigeria from 1980-2010. The paper employed the use of Ordinary Least Square (OLS) and Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) unit root test to undertake our analysis, with total social services spending by the federal government serving as dependent variable, while internal debt, external debt, debt service payments and exchange rate as exogenous variables. Our results indicate a positive relationship between internal debt, exchange rate and social services provision, while an inverse relationship exist between external debt and social service provision. The study suggested the need for more innovativeness in tax collection and administration, implementation of more Public-Private-Partnership in infrastructural financing and reverting to medium term national development planning culture and programme based budgeting (PBB) as coherent alternatives towards improving quality and scope of social services provision in Nigeria.

Keywords: Internal Debt, External Debt, Social Services Provision and Debt Service Payments