The increasingly loud demand that state governments justify the increase in funds received from the Federal Account Allocation Committee (FACC) is quite justified.
Notwithstanding the responsibility that the Federal Government must bear for its corresponding 52.68 per cent share of revenue, there is good reason that the state and local governments must live up to their appropriate responsibilities on security and welfare of the people as stipulated in Section 14 (2)(b) of the constitution.
It is reported that of the N16.04 trillion that accrued to the three tiers of government in 2023, the 36 states and 774 local governments together received a total of N6.57 trillion.
Specifically, these two tiers of government received N3.34 trillion in the six months of July to December 2023 a period that the Bola Ahmed Tinubu presidency declared a removal of fuel subsidy and more money accrued therefrom into the public purse.
The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) figures are quoted to say that N545 billion, (19.5 per cent) more was shared to the two tiers of government in just six months ending December last year. The Independent Media and Policy Initiative (IMPI) has rightly noted that ‘the increased revenue shared has not been reflected in the lives of Nigerians residing in the states.’
Analysts and observers of public affairs have habitually focused on what the central government does or fails to do. There is a good reason for this. In the uniquely warped concept of federalism that operates in this country, the Federal Government sits on the vast majority of the natural resources that should, by global best practices, belong to the constituent units of the federation.
Furthermore, this rather remote central authority grabs 52.68 per cent of the revenue collected all over the federation. Thirty-six states and 774 local councils where reside the people of the country are supposed, by a contrived formula that defies commonsense or indeed any other type of sense, to make do with 26.72 per cent, and 20.60 per cent respectively of the federally collected revenue.
The avoidable consequence of this sharing formula is the persistent scrutiny as well as negative attention that the Federal Government brings upon itself.
The lower tiers of government that constitutionally bear their commensurate burden of governance are only too happy to stay in the shadows while engaging largely in outrageously injudicious spending of public money entrusted to them. State and local governments seem to (conveniently) forget that when and if, as indeed it does, the Constitution says that ‘the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government’ this it means every tier of government, not the Federal Government alone.
It stands to reason therefore, that failure to live up to this stipulation is a betrayal of both the provision as well as the oaths of office of the respective state and local government chief executives. In respect to some specific areas such as education, infrastructure, and power, most of the states and the local councils have very much underperformed. This is even more disappointing in respect of the states with relatively huge inflow of funds from the federal pool.
On education, many states, including Lagos, Bayelsa, Edo and Imo do not meet the UNESCO recommended annual allocation of between 15 and 20 per cent in their 2024 budgets. This is despite a commitment collectively made by the Governors’ Forum in October 2023 to allocate ‘above 15 per cent of our [state] budgets to education.’ ‘We must follow the UNESCO standard for an education system that is progressive and sustainable’ said Oyo State governor Seyi Makinde. It is gratifying that he has walked his talk by allocating 20.8 per cent or N90.6 billion of 2024 budget of N434.2 billion to education. Jigawa, Enugu, and Kano states are reported to allocate respectively 31.73, 30.44 and 27.8 percentages of their 2024 budgets to education.
On health, whereas the top three states’ budgetary allocations are in percentage terms 16.46 in Kano, 15.63 in Kaduna, and 15.05 in Yobe, the lowest include Lagos 7.15, Cross River 11.11, Akwa Ibom 3.96, Delta 6.6, and Imo 3.93.
The extant constitution grants in Section 162 (2) oil producing states ‘not less than thirteen per cent of the revenue accruing to the Federation Account directly from any natural resources.’ In 2022, the NBS calculated that the nine benefitting states received a total of N970.2 billion that was an increase of 115.5 per cent more than the N450 billion of the preceding year, 2021. Delta State received the highest amount of N296.63 billion while Anambra got N4.25 billion.
Nonetheless, some of these remain the least developed in the federation. For example, Akwa Ibom had 581,800 out-of-school children according to an NBS 2020 report. A 2012 UNESCO report ranked Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Delta, Edo, Cross River, and Bayelsa states behind Lagos, Ekiti, Osun, and Anambra states in literacy rates.
Infrastructures are critical to development but at all levels of government, this idea does not seem to sink well. This explains the sorry state of the country’s economy. Shortly after taking office, President Tinubu approved an Infrastructure Support Fund to be shared among the three levels of government.
The then Presidential spokesperson, Dele Alake said the fund would ‘enable the states to intervene and invest in the critical areas of transportation, including farm to market road improvement…health…education…power and water resources…’.
This is a welcomed initiative but Nigerians would want to know how much was put in this fund, which government got what, and how money received has been expended. In simple terms, we demand utmost transparency in both the disbursement and the application of this fund.
To be continued tomorrow.