Akwa Ibom in South-South Nigeria, received the highest
allocation of N116.6 billion from the federation account in 2016, according to
the latest report by Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative
(NEITI)
Dr Orji Ogbonnaya Orji, the Director, Communications of
NEITI released the Quarterly Review of the Federation Accounts Allocation
Committee (FAAC) by NEITI in Abuja.
Lagos and Rivers followed Akwa Ibom with N109.3 billion and
103.98 billion respectively.
The report, which is the third in the series by NEITI,
examined the breakdown and analysis of disbursements from the federation
account to the three tiers of government.
It also looked at the Internally Generated Revenues (IGR) of
the states in 2016.
It noted that although no reason was clearly given for the
highest allocation received by Akwa Ibom, analysts suggested that it might not
be unconnected with the vantage sharing position of the state under the 13 per
cent derivation principles.
The report showed that Kwara and Ebonyi received the least
federal allocations of N30.08 billion and 30.09 billion.
On allocation to local governments, the report said that Lagos
topped the table with a total of N69.29 billion allocated to the 20 local
governments in the state.
It showed that the 44 local governments in Kano State
received a total of N56.16 billion also in 2016.
On disbursements to the Federal Government in 2016, the
report disclosed the total FAAC allocation stood at N2.08trillion as against
the N6.06 trillion budgeted for that year, which represented about 34 per cent
of the budget.
It noted that the implication could be linked to the
noticeable challenges by the Federal Government to meet recurrent expenditure
needs estimated at N2.6 trillion in 2016.
The report highlighted that payments to the three tiers of
government had continued to decline by an average of 40 per cent between 2013
and 2016.
“The Federal Government received N3.711 trillion in 2013 and
this fell by 43.9per cent to N2.08 trillion in 2016,’’ the report said.
Similarly, disbursements to State Governments totaled N3.095
trillion in 2013.
According to NEITI, in 2016, States received N1.642
trillion, which represented a 46.9 per cent decline on the 2013 figures; local
governments received total disbursements amounting to N1.011 trillion in 2016.
It said that this was 40.7 per cent lower than the figure of
N1.708 trillion they received in 2013.
Comparing 2015 and 2016 figures, NEITI’s publication
disclosed that the revenues disbursed by FAAC to the three tiers of government
fell by 15 per cent from N6.011 trillion in 2015 to N5.121 trillion in 2016.
Other features of the review were in the areas of IGR of the
federation, the rising debts and the concern of Nigerians for states to reduce
dependence on federal allocations.
“IGR is very low in most states and it is only in two states
of Lagos and Ogun that the IGR is higher than FAAC allocations.
“Figures show that total revenue by itself cannot fund
states budget,’’ it said.
The report added that the revenues of all the states
government fell drastically short of the budgets projections.
It cited some states like Lagos which had a budget of
N662.60 billion, but the total revenue that accrued to it was N410.5billion
leaving a shortfall of about N252 billion.
Adamawa had revenue of N41.05 billion against a budget of
N130.10 billion; while Nassarawa had revenue of N32.5 billion to fund a budget
of N77.30 billion.
It further stated that some states such as Cross River,
Sokoto, Borno, Jigawa, Osun and Plateau had total revenues in 2016 which were
below 30 per cent of their budgets.
The report noted that state governments were rapidly piling
up debts.
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