Nigeria has paid an additional $7.15 million to increase its stake in pan-African housing development firm, Shelter Afrique.
The firm confirmed this in a statement on Monday.
This is the second time in two years the country if increasing its stake in the firm.
In September 2020, the institution received a $9.4 million additional capital subscription from Nigeria.
The additional stake takes Nigeria’s shareholding to 15.8 per cent, 1 per cent behind top shareholder, Kenya, which currently stands at 16.85 per cent .
The firm listed other top three shareholders of Shelter Afrique whose shareholdings have also changed to include African Development Bank (AfDB), which now stands at 12.16 per cent down from 12.71 per cent; Mali at 5.3 per cent down from 5.54 per cent; and Ghana at 5.05 per cent down from 5.28 per cent.
Shelter Afrique recently completed a debut N46 billion ($110.7 million) series 1 fixed rate senior unsecured bond issuance in Nigeria’s capital market under its N200 billion ($481.3 million) bond issuance programme for housing and urban development in Nigeria.
According to the firm, it plans similar bond issuance in East African markets, including Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda.
Chief finance officer of the firm, Kingsley Muwowo, said the move now places Nigeria in a good position to become the largest shareholder in Shelter-Afrique.
“We are grateful to the government of Nigeria for their continued support and the importance they have placed on affordable housing. We are especially grateful to the Honourable Minister for Works and Housing Babatunde Fashola, Honorable Minister for State, Engineer Abubakar Aliyu, and Honorable Minister for Finance Dr Zainab Shamsuna Ahmed, for their long-term support and for honouring this significant payment. Additionally, we appreciate Nigeria’s active shareholder and board participation,” Muwowo said.
It said other countries that have so far ramped up the capital subscription in the pan-African housing development financier in 2022 are Swaziland and Burkina Faso which paid $317,854.54 and $34,610.00, respectively, for additional stakes.
“So far, we have received $7,504,295.45 in additional capital from member States within the last six months of 2022. We are grateful to our shareholders for this much-needed capital injection which will go a long way in strengthening the capital structure of the Company to support the ongoing fund-raising efforts to raise additional debt capital required to support the project pipeline which now stands at US$1 billion across 44 member countries,” Muwowo said.
