Public funds alone can’t fix infrastructure gap – AltBank

The Alternative Bank has said Nigeria must significantly increase private-sector investment in infrastructure, warning that public budgets alone cannot meet the country’s growing financing needs.

The bank said the government’s limited resources were already under pressure from competing demands, including security, healthcare, education, debt servicing and social spending, making greater mobilisation of long-term private capital necessary to finance power, transport, digital connectivity and other infrastructure projects.

The bank stated this in a statement issued on Wednesday following its participation at the Nigeria Infrastructure Conference, INFRACON 2026, held in Abuja.

Speaking during a session titled, “Financing Infrastructure — Unlocking Private Capital,” the Branch Manager of The Alternative Bank’s Dei-Dei Branch, Jacob Achem, said closing Nigeria’s infrastructure deficit would require financing structures capable of attracting investors beyond the public sector.

“The infrastructure gap is too large to be addressed by public funding alone,” Achem said. “We need to unlock private capital and create financing structures that allow more investors to participate in Nigeria’s development.”

Achem represented the bank’s Divisional Head at the conference, which brought together policymakers, business leaders, development finance institutions and infrastructure experts to examine ways of moving infrastructure projects from planning to implementation.

According to the statement, the discussions focused on mobilising investment for critical sectors such as power and renewable energy, maritime and the blue economy, digital infrastructure and development projects at the subnational level.

The bank argued that attracting sufficient capital would depend not merely on identifying infrastructure deficits but on developing bankable projects with appropriate financing structures and partnerships capable of giving long-term investors confidence.

Achem said the scale of the challenge required stronger collaboration among government institutions, financial institutions, development partners and private investors.

He also identified non-interest finance as one of the funding mechanisms that could help channel capital into infrastructure and other productive assets.

“Non-interest finance gives us another way to think about capital deployment,” he said. “It connects financing with productive assets, sustainable projects, and real economic value.”

According to the bank, non-interest financing could contribute to infrastructure development by linking investment directly to real assets and measurable project outcomes.

This approach, it said, could broaden the financing options available for viable projects at a time when fiscal constraints limit the government’s capacity to fund large infrastructure projects directly.

Achem maintained that attention must increasingly move from repeatedly identifying Nigeria’s infrastructure requirements to creating investment structures capable of converting viable projects into opportunities for private capital.

“The question is no longer whether Nigeria needs infrastructure,” he said. “The question is how quickly we can bring the right capital, structures, and partnerships together to deliver it.”

The session on private capital and infrastructure financing was led by the Regional Director, Anglophone West Africa, African Export-Import Bank, Kudakwashe Matereke.

The conference was organised by the Nigerian Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture and held from July 14 to 15 at the Afreximbank African Trade Centre Towers in Abuja.

It had the theme, “Mobilising Private Capital for Sustainable Infrastructure Development in Nigeria.”

The Alternative Bank said the discussions reflected the growing need to develop financing models that could draw private and institutional capital into infrastructure projects while ensuring that investments were tied to productive economic activities.

It added that creating more bankable projects, improving partnerships and deploying financing models suited to long-term investment would be critical to accelerating infrastructure delivery across the country.

A former Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Mr Olawale Edun, recently disclosed that Nigeria has a $14bn annual infrastructure investment gap, for which it continues to seek both domestic and foreign investment.