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Report shows government recorded zero capital budget implementation in first half of 2016

By Mathias Okwe
05 February 2017   |   4:11 am
The 2016 Appropriation Bill, which is the first fully prepared and executed by the current administration, was signed into law in May 2016, and by October 31 of that year, the sum of N635.770b, representing...

Budget

As Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government begin to defend their 2017 budget proposals before the National Assembly, nothing much is known of their first half of 2016 capital votes implementation activities. Two reports detailing the 2016 budget implementation in the two first quarters of last year, belatedly released by the Budget Office of the Federation has indicated.

The 2016 Appropriation Bill, which is the first fully prepared and executed by the current administration, was signed into law in May 2016, and by October 31 of that year, the sum of N635.770b, representing about 40 per cent of the N1.588 trillion approved for capital votes for the year had been released to the MDAs, according to a comprehensive capital votes release document obtained by The Guardian, from the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) at the weekend.

This new figure by the OAGF is over N100b below the N770b figure earlier announced by the Ministry of Budget and National Planning as amount so far released to MDAs, as at October 2016 for capital votes implementation in the year’s fiscal plan.

Meanwhile, the two first quarters of 2016 budget implementation reports also obtained by The Guardian are devoid of the usual spotlights and pictures of projects being undertaken, and their levels of delivery, which further confirms the suspicion that no capital votes implementation, nor monitoring activities by the Monitoring and Evaluation Department of the Budget Ministry took place.

The Second Quarter Report said: “The provisional report presents the macroeconomic environment and fiscal outcome of the implementation of the budget in the second quarter. The budget office and staff of the National Monitoring and Evaluation Department in particular, with MDAs, civil society organisations and representatives of media organisations, will soon commence the physical monitoring and evaluation of selected capital projects for the quarter. The outcome of this effort will be reported in subsequent reports,” the reports signed by both the Minister of Budget and National Planning Ministry, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, and the Director General of the Budget Office of the Federation, Ben Akabueze, respectively confirmed.

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