Assets of Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA) grew 16 percent in 2018 to 617.70 billion naira compared with 533.88 billion in the previous year, the manager of the country’s sovereign wealth fund (SWF) has said.
Nigeria, Africa's top oil producer established its Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF) in 2011 with a seed capital of $1 billion and later injected additional $500 million as part of measures to invest the excess proceeds of earnings from oil imports above the budget benchmark.
NSIA, which was described by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) recent as the worst transparently run SWF said in its latest report that its total equity reserves have grown to 543.38 billion naira in 2018 versus 501.05 billion naira in the previous year.
The SWF manager said that it posted a total income of 57.73 billion naira last year, boosted by foreign exchange adjustment against 30.41 billion in the previous year.
Nigeria's currency exchange against the dollar at 175 to the dollar at the time the Fund was established by the government while currency adjustment means the NSIA now use an exchange rate of 325 naira to the dollar against 305 naira per dollar used in the previous year to reflects its forex transactions.
Africa's biggest economy is one of the continent's major oil producer operating SWF as a vehicle to manage its revenue from crude oil exports.
Angola another major oil producer in the continent has about $5 billion in its SWF, but corruption has been a major issue in its management.
Jose Filomeno dos Santos, son of the former Angolan president was recently charged for illegal transferring about $500 million part of the country's Fund for personal use.
Libya and Morrocco are two other African countries operating SWF, the story of loss and corruption remains the same across the continent in the management of the Fund.
A leak recently showed that the daughter of Chief of staff to President Mohammadu Buhari, Abba Kyari was employed as a senior staff of the NSIA through the backdoor, in a country where many youths are unemployed and thousands of government job opening are filled by relatives of top government officials.
NSIA was mandated to play a leading role in driving sustained economic development for the benefit of all Nigerians through building a savings base for the Nigerian people, enhancing the development of Nigeria’s infrastructure and providing stabilisation support in times of economic stress.
NSIA operates three mandate funds: the Stabilisation Fund, the Future Generations Fund and the Nigeria Infrastructure Fund.
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