The Senate on Wednesday, May 15, approved President Bola Tinubu’s request to obtain a loan of $500 million to finance the mass metering programme of the F.G.

The Deputy Senate President, Barau Jibrin, who presided over the plenary, announced the approval after a majority of the lawmakers supported it through a voice vote.

The upper chamber approved the fund for the Bureau of Public Enterprises (PBE) after considering a report of its Committee on Local and Foreign Debt, presented by Haruna Manu, its vice chairman. “The programme development objective of this project is to improve financial and technical performance of electricity distribution companies,” the Senate report said.

The 500 million US dollar loan is part of the $7.94 billion loan which President Tinubu sought the Senate’s approval for on November 1st 2023 under the 2022-2024 external borrowing plan. The President also sought approval for €100 million. However, the Senate approved borrowing $7.4 billion during its special plenary on December 30.