Niger State Governor, Abubakar Sani Bello, was, on Thursday, presented N151.2 billion budget for the 2021 fiscal year to the State House of Assembly.
The N151,240,621,776.00 2021 budget which was with the Theme: “Budget of Prioritise Reality” was 2.71 per cent lower than the original and outgoing 2020 budget of N155,459,814,701.00
The Governor who was represented by his deputy, Alhaji Ahmed Mohammed Ketso, said: “The 2021 proposed budget estimate was made up of N72,503,201,830.88 representing 47.94 per cent, as Recurrent Estimate and N78,737,419,945.12 representing 52.06 per cent of the budget size as capital estimates.
He explained that the budget was to be financed through the usual traditional sources of statutory allocation from Federation Account, Value Added Tax,( VAT) Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) and Capital Receipts.
He stated further, that out of the N151,240,621,776.00 proposed budget, N71,955,049,902.00 or 47.58 per cent, was expected to accrue from the Federation Account, N17, 999,524,715.00 representing 11.91 per cent from Value-Added Tax, while N14,744,770,399.00 or 9.74 per cent was to be generated internally.
“The sum of N42,201,250,249.00 representing 27.90 per cent of the budget is expected as a capital receipt from development partners, grants, loans among others.
“Other expected revenue sources include; Dividends from North-South Power N500,000,000.00, Refund from National Electricity Liability Company (NELCO) N3,510,026,517.00 and Refund from Federal Roads N330,000,000.00 which account for 0.33 per cent, 2.32 per cent and 0.22 per cent, respectively,” he maintained.
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According to the Governor, the economic sector has the highest allocation of N54.257 billion or 68.90 per cent and closely followed by the social sector with N16.084 billion or 20.42 per cent and Administrative Sector with 9.02 per cent or N7.095 billion. The law and justice sector has a proposed estimate of N1.3 billion.
Governor Sani Bello, however, lamented that the outgoing year 2020, has been tough on almost all fronts, saying, “from the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic to the most recent #EndSARS protest that engulfed the nation. Indeed, the impact of the pandemic affected almost all governments in all the nations of the world,” he argued.
Meanwhile, in his remarks, the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Abdullahi Bawa Wuse, assured that the lawmakers will ensure the budget was scrutinised and given speedy passage.
Additionally, he expressed the determination of the State House of Assembly to partner with the Executive Arm and Security Agencies in ensuring that the insecurity challenges bedeviling the state was tackled headlong.
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