A Review Of Niger 2014 Budget
When Governor Muazu Babangida Aliyu presented the 2014 budget
before the Niger State House of Assembly late last year he informed the
people of the state that the major preoccupation of the administration
in the execution of the fiscal estimate when eventually passed by the
legislators will be to focus on the completion of all ongoing projects.
He also said that the government realising that revenue accruable to all the states of the federation from the federation account has continued to decline will pursue aggressively internally generated revenue and also strengthen the synergy between the state and its 25 local government areas for delivery of more dividends of democracy to the people at the grassroots.
In 2014 Governor Aliyu also said that the administration will explore the support of the international donor agencies and development partners to be able to raise more funds for the execution of projects just as he also pledged that funds from the Subsidy Reinvestment Programme SURE-P introduced in 2012 by the federal government to cushion the effect of the partial withdrawal of subsidy from petroleum products will be fully utilised.
The governor argued that the 2014 budget, being the last full budget that the present administration which came into office seven years ago will be presenting to the legislature for approval since the exist period for the regime is May 2015, there is therefore the need for all hands to be placed on deck for the realization of the mission and vision of the administration and to lay a more solid foundation for incoming administration to build upon.
As it has become the practice, Governor Aliyu was the first governor in the country to present a budget to the assembly for approval and without waste of time the assembly after critically scrutinising the document passed it into law early in 2014, giving the executive arm of government the legal right to start spending right from the beginning of the year unlike other assemblies who will not complete their constitutional duties on the budget until the end of the first quarter of the year.
The total fiscal estimate as presented to the assembly by Governor Aliyu is N98.85bn out of which N69.69bn is to be generated from the federation account, N9.2bn from the state share of collection from the Value Added Tax and N6.3bn Internally Generated Revenue.
The state is to also get N2.61bn from the Subsidy Re-investment Programme SURE-P and N11.0bn from the capital market.
With the first quarter of the year gone, it is necessary to examine how well the budget has performed and if the government is in position to meet its expectations and those of the public.
There is no doubt that like it happened in the last part of the 2013 financial year, revenue from the federation account in the first quarter of 2014 has been on the downward trend ( it dipped to an all time low of 46% in March this year) resulting in only N11.50bn being generated from this source as against the projected income of N17.42bn for the period though the income from this source still constitutes 62.47% of the total revenue realised in the first quarter of the year.
The internally generated revenue drive of the government still fell short of expectation of the administration recording only N1.130bn or 71.58% in the first quarter of the year. The performance of the IGR which is just 6.14% of the total income of the state for the period indicates that officials of the Board of Internal Revenue still have a lot to do if the state is to meet its target for the year 2014.
Though the vice chairman of the state Planning Commission Alhaji Yahaya Dansalau sees “a steady improvement” in the IGR collection for the first quarter of the year compared to what was generated in the same period last year attributing it to “an overhaul of revenue collection and implementation of IGR strategy and the new law on revenue collections”, there is still need for the source to perform better than it is presently doing.
One revenue generation source which did not fall below the expectation of the government in the first quarter of the year is the Capital Receipts. This source in the period was able to perform up to 91.% of the projection for the source and contributing 14.34% of the total funds flow to the coffers of the administration. The improvement recorded from this sector followed the bonds fund utilisation, draw down of N972m from the World Bank for RAMP and activities of the United Nations Children Emergency Funds UNICEF.
However unlike in the first quarter of last year when the state generated over N17,489,662,735.45 from all sources, there was a little improvement in the first quarter income for the year 2014 with a total income of N18,416,004,061.10.
The recurrent expenditure, including personnel and overhead costs and consolidated charges reduced by about N1bn in the first quarter of the year 2014 when compared to similar expenditure in the same period in 2013.
Despite the decline in the income of the government in the first quarter of the year it was still able to fulfill its obligations to the people and also service its debt. The Economic Social Regional General Administration and Science and Technology received for the first quarter of the year recorded between 12.78% and 99.72% performance.
The state has not only been regularly paying the salaries and allowances of its workers, supply of drugs and other medicaments to hospitals and basic health centres and clinics across the state has not been interrupted just as treated water continue to flow from the taps in towns and cities in the state.
He also said that the government realising that revenue accruable to all the states of the federation from the federation account has continued to decline will pursue aggressively internally generated revenue and also strengthen the synergy between the state and its 25 local government areas for delivery of more dividends of democracy to the people at the grassroots.
In 2014 Governor Aliyu also said that the administration will explore the support of the international donor agencies and development partners to be able to raise more funds for the execution of projects just as he also pledged that funds from the Subsidy Reinvestment Programme SURE-P introduced in 2012 by the federal government to cushion the effect of the partial withdrawal of subsidy from petroleum products will be fully utilised.
The governor argued that the 2014 budget, being the last full budget that the present administration which came into office seven years ago will be presenting to the legislature for approval since the exist period for the regime is May 2015, there is therefore the need for all hands to be placed on deck for the realization of the mission and vision of the administration and to lay a more solid foundation for incoming administration to build upon.
As it has become the practice, Governor Aliyu was the first governor in the country to present a budget to the assembly for approval and without waste of time the assembly after critically scrutinising the document passed it into law early in 2014, giving the executive arm of government the legal right to start spending right from the beginning of the year unlike other assemblies who will not complete their constitutional duties on the budget until the end of the first quarter of the year.
The total fiscal estimate as presented to the assembly by Governor Aliyu is N98.85bn out of which N69.69bn is to be generated from the federation account, N9.2bn from the state share of collection from the Value Added Tax and N6.3bn Internally Generated Revenue.
The state is to also get N2.61bn from the Subsidy Re-investment Programme SURE-P and N11.0bn from the capital market.
With the first quarter of the year gone, it is necessary to examine how well the budget has performed and if the government is in position to meet its expectations and those of the public.
There is no doubt that like it happened in the last part of the 2013 financial year, revenue from the federation account in the first quarter of 2014 has been on the downward trend ( it dipped to an all time low of 46% in March this year) resulting in only N11.50bn being generated from this source as against the projected income of N17.42bn for the period though the income from this source still constitutes 62.47% of the total revenue realised in the first quarter of the year.
The internally generated revenue drive of the government still fell short of expectation of the administration recording only N1.130bn or 71.58% in the first quarter of the year. The performance of the IGR which is just 6.14% of the total income of the state for the period indicates that officials of the Board of Internal Revenue still have a lot to do if the state is to meet its target for the year 2014.
Though the vice chairman of the state Planning Commission Alhaji Yahaya Dansalau sees “a steady improvement” in the IGR collection for the first quarter of the year compared to what was generated in the same period last year attributing it to “an overhaul of revenue collection and implementation of IGR strategy and the new law on revenue collections”, there is still need for the source to perform better than it is presently doing.
One revenue generation source which did not fall below the expectation of the government in the first quarter of the year is the Capital Receipts. This source in the period was able to perform up to 91.% of the projection for the source and contributing 14.34% of the total funds flow to the coffers of the administration. The improvement recorded from this sector followed the bonds fund utilisation, draw down of N972m from the World Bank for RAMP and activities of the United Nations Children Emergency Funds UNICEF.
However unlike in the first quarter of last year when the state generated over N17,489,662,735.45 from all sources, there was a little improvement in the first quarter income for the year 2014 with a total income of N18,416,004,061.10.
The recurrent expenditure, including personnel and overhead costs and consolidated charges reduced by about N1bn in the first quarter of the year 2014 when compared to similar expenditure in the same period in 2013.
Despite the decline in the income of the government in the first quarter of the year it was still able to fulfill its obligations to the people and also service its debt. The Economic Social Regional General Administration and Science and Technology received for the first quarter of the year recorded between 12.78% and 99.72% performance.
The state has not only been regularly paying the salaries and allowances of its workers, supply of drugs and other medicaments to hospitals and basic health centres and clinics across the state has not been interrupted just as treated water continue to flow from the taps in towns and cities in the state.
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