COVID-19: Oyo budget lowered by N39.7bn

The Oyo State House of Assembly, on Tuesday, passed into law a bill for the downward review of the 2020 budget to the sum of N39,700,579,761.51.

Governor Seyi Makinde had in a letter read at plenary on July 15 sought a review of the budget in acknowledgement of paucity of funds occasioned by COVID-19 threatening 100 per cent budget performance.

Down from the sum of N213,788,033,002.97 passed into law on December 19, 2019, the budget for the state is now the sum of N174,087,453,241.46.

As contained in a report presented at Tuesday’s plenary by Chairman, House Committee on Public Accounts, Finance and Appropriation, Honourable Akeem Mustapha, the sum of N108,905,099,631.46 is now for recurrent expenditure and the sum of N65,182,353,610 as capital expenditure.

While delivering the report, Mustapha had noted that a review of the budget performance of activities of Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) from January to July showed a budget performance of between 20 and 30 per cent.

To achieve a good budget performance, the report pointed to the existence of leakages in the collection of taxes and the need to effectively capture the informal sector.

Decrying that most MDAs performed below average in their revenue performance, the Assembly also urged the state Board of Internal Revenue and other revenue-generating MDAs to automate tax collection in the state so as to block leakages.

As a matter of importance, the report asked the executive arm to give requisite finances and logistics support to MDAs and revenue-generating agencies for them to perform optimally.

The Assembly especially commended the state government for embracing realistic budgeting, regular payment of salaries, pensions and gratuities.

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