By Nasir Dambatta
Every month, before a single naira is spent on schools, hospitals, security or infrastructure, Kaduna State loses ₦6.7 billion to debt servicing.
The deduction is automatic. It comes directly from the state’s allocation to service loans inherited from previous administrations. The money does not wait for budget approvals, procurement processes or government priorities. It leaves first. Governance begins with what remains.
Governor Uba Sani recently brought renewed attention to this reality during an interview on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme, where he disclosed that Kaduna currently pays about ₦6.7 billion every month on inherited debt obligations.
He also reiterated that his administration has not contracted a single new loan since assuming office in May 2023.
Those two facts — a heavy inherited debt burden and a decision not to borrow — provide the context within which Kaduna’s infrastructure story should be assessed.
It is easy to build roads when fresh loans are flowing. It is far more difficult to do so when billions of naira are being deducted monthly before government spending even begins.
Yet, despite these constraints, the Uba Sani administration has embarked on one of the most extensive road construction programmes in Kaduna State’s recent history.
Government records indicate that about 150 road projects covering more than 1,500 kilometres have been initiated across the state’s 23 local government areas. The projects form part of the administration’s Urban Renewal and Rural Transformation Programme, which seeks to bridge infrastructure gaps in both urban centres and underserved rural communities.
The spread of the projects is as significant as their scale.
In Zaria and Sabon Gari, multiple township roads have been flagged off and completed. In Kwoi, headquarters of Jaba Local Government Area, residents who had waited decades for major road interventions have witnessed the construction of several township roads and the strategic Kwoi-Gora Road, a critical link for economic and social activities.
At Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, the ongoing reconstruction of approximately 60 kilometres of internal roads, complete with drainage systems, street lighting and pedestrian facilities, has transformed mobility within one of Africa’s largest universities.
Perhaps the most symbolic example is the Kabala-Costain Road project in Kaduna North Local Government Area.
The project had become a reference point for abandoned infrastructure. Despite huge public expenditure in previous years, it remained incomplete and largely unusable. According to officials of the Kaduna Roads Agency (KADRA), the current administration first settled inherited liabilities running into billions of naira before remobilising contractors to site. Today, the project has regained momentum and is steadily moving towards completion.
These examples are important because they reveal something often overlooked in public discussions about infrastructure: roads are not built by rhetoric. They are built by resources, planning and financial discipline.
The real story, therefore, is not merely that roads are being constructed. It is that they are being constructed while Kaduna continues to shoulder one of the heaviest debt-servicing obligations among Nigeria’s sub-national governments.
Governor Uba Sani has repeatedly argued that prudent management rather than borrowing has enabled the state to maintain development spending. During his recent television appearance, he attributed the administration’s ability to function under pressure to careful prioritisation of projects and disciplined allocation of available resources.
That approach appears to have shaped governance across sectors. Beyond infrastructure, the administration has invested in agriculture, healthcare, education, skills development and social protection while maintaining its position against fresh borrowing.
Critics may debate the pace of development or the adequacy of specific projects. That is normal in a democracy. What is harder to dispute is the fiscal environment within which those projects are being executed.
A government paying ₦6.7 billion every month in inherited debt obligations is operating with significantly reduced fiscal space. Every kilometre of road completed, every school renovated and every healthcare facility upgraded must be financed from resources that remain after those deductions have been made. The governor has also stated that the repayment obligation is expected to continue for years, stretching as far as 2048.
That reality makes Kaduna’s ongoing road expansion programme more than an infrastructure story. It is also a story about fiscal management.
Measured against the weight of a ₦6.7 billion monthly debt-servicing obligation, the scale of road construction across Kaduna presents a compelling case study in governance under financial pressure. Whether viewed through a political, economic or developmental lens, the central fact remains unchanged: while servicing inherited debts running into billions of naira every month, the Uba Sani administration has continued to build roads across the state without adding a new debt burden.
In a period when many governments rely heavily on borrowing to fund capital projects, Kaduna’s experience offers a different narrative — one in which infrastructure expansion is being pursued despite severe financial constraints rather than because those constraints do not exist.
*Dambatta is Senior Special Assistant to the Governor on Print Media*
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