The federal government has disclosed that 28 states of the federation accessed about $68 million loans through the States Action on Business Enabling Reforms (SABER) programme approved by the World Bank.

Chairman of SABER Steering Committee and Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Finance, Mrs. Lydia Shehu Jafiya, made the disclosure in Abuja yesterday, during the 2025 National Sensitisation Workshop .

She noted that “Aside three (3) states, the remaining thirty-three states of the Federation including FCT had signed up to the Subsidiary Loan Agreement (SLA) and at least 28 states got between USD$1 – USD$4 million in Prior Results Disbursements from a total disbursement of USD$68.36 million recently concluded.

“Presently, arrangements have been concluded with an Independent Verification Firm to conduct the year 2023 and 2024 performance assessment. The lesson learnt under SFTAS has improve our performance with greater transparency in business relations with government, optimised processes for land acquisition for investment, strengthened Grievance Redress Mechanisms (GRM) processes,” she explained.

Also speaking, Director, Home Finance Department and National Programme Coordinator, Dr. Ali Mohammed said the workshop was convened to sensitise critical stakeholders on the successes and challenges recorded in programme implementation in the last two years with a view to charting pathways to more successful programme implementation in the third year of the implementation of the SABER programme.

He added that the SABER Programme is a 3-year (2023-2025) US$750m Programme for Results that seeks to incentivise states to implement critical reforms aimed at improving efficiency in land administration, the regulatory framework for private investment in fiber optic deployment, services provided by investment promotion agencies and public private partnership