Photo: Contributed
By: Nghiinomenwa-vali Hangala
For the next 4 months (November 2026 to January 2027) the government will go to the market to borrow N$4.7 billion to top up on it revenue gap for the financial year.
This also means those with funds looking for a place to grow or to earn returns can lend to the government in the three months.
The country treasurer revealed this in the Quarterly Borrowing Plan released last week by the Bank of Namibia.
According to the planned net issuance of Nov–Jan, N$4.1 billion will be raised through Fixed-rate Bonds; around half a billion will be through inflation-linked bonds (N$595m), and the remainder will be raised through T-Bills (N$71m).
Most of it will be raised in January 2027, 77.7% of the quarter’s planned net issuance.
During the FY2026/27 Mid-Year Budget Review, government revenue has been revised down by N$1.5 billion to N$88.054 million, and expenditure down by N$988 million to N$105.04 billion.
As the reduction in revenue exceeded the expenditure adjustment, the budget deficit widened by N$517 million to N$16.3 billion, approximately 5.5% of GDP.
Notwithstanding the wider deficit, the net borrowing requirement was revised down by N$365 million to N$28,9billion.
Most of this money (N$27,8 billion) is being borrowed from domestic markets (institutions and individual investors), only N$1.1 billion will be borrowed externally.
In terms of loan repayments: the government estimates to repay N$1.9 billion of its foreign loan principal repayments while local bond redemptions is estimated to cost around N$4billion.
“The higher redemption estimate reflects an expectation of lower participation in the remaining GC27 switch auction, which would leave a larger outstanding balance for cash redemption at maturity on 15 January 2027,” the plan read.
Total Government debt is expected to reach N$201.6 billion over FY2026/27, rising by 12.3 percent year-on-year.
The increase reflected higher issuance of Treasury Bills and Internal Registered Stock.
As a share of GDP, Central Government debt is expected to slightly rise to 68.7 percent, up by 4.9 percentage points from a year earlier.
Going forward, total debt is projected to increase to N$215.7 billion in FY2027/28 and to N$228.0 billion by FY2028/29, averaging 67.7 percent of GDP and remaining above the SADC convergence benchmark of 60.0 percent.
