Nigeria’s foreign policy goals and deficit financing: Investigating Nigeria’s 2015 deficit financing implications

This research work examined Nigeria’s Foreign Policy Goals and Deficit Financing using 2015 Appropriation Act as the case study. The study was necessitated by the fact that budget deficit seems to have become the norm despite criticisms against it. The researcher was worried that despite the fact that successive Nigerian governments resorted to budget deficits without achieving the desired results, the trend persisted. To finance these deficits, Nigerian governments had resorted to borrowings (locally and externally) and appeal for grants. The conditions that normally attend these foreign loans and grants apparently yoke the Nigerian state asymmetrically with the providers of such loans or grants. This is worrisome. It is also attended with debt servicing issues. The researcher therefore set out to examine how the deficit financing affect Nigeria’s Foreign Policy Goals. The researcher was interested in finding out how conditions associated with deficit financing especially that of year 2015 budget affected the pursuit of Nigeria’s foreign policy goals. The researcher used the Dependency theory as the theoretical framework. Research data were gathered essentially through the use of documentary method while content analysis served as the analytical tool. The study found among other things that Deficit Financing through foreign loans and grants weakens the pursuit of Nigeria’s foreign policy goals. The researcher therefore recommended that Nigerian governments should seek alternative means of growing the economy and minimize recourse to foreign loans and grants.