My fears for 2017 budget

LAST week, I had a conversation with a Lawyer friend on thepossibility of the nation’s budget 2017 delivering the goods. TheBarrister asked if I had read the budget document. Of course, he knew Ihave been studying the document since its presentation by PresidentMuhammadu Buhari.

But his submission pulled me off my feet. The man simply submittedthat he lost hope after seeing the huge figures allocated for clearingof sewage in the budget. He however concluded that having read throughthe close to N1 billion voted for feeding in the Presidency; he wasassured that the amount voted for sewage clearance was justified! “Ifyou will spend close to one billion to feed, you equally need hugemoney to clear the sewage,” he concluded.

That could sound pedestrian but it is real. The 2017 budget aspresented by President Buhari offers very lean hopes of reviving thenation’s economy, even though it was called a budget of growth. And ifthe nation will get its economy back on track, it will certainly notbe as a result of the magic of the budget.

The projections are difficult to harness. The budget puts the exchangerate of the naira at N305 to the US Dollar, when Naira is selling forclose to N500 to one dollar. It projects a daily oil production of 2.2million barrels and has a 30.7 percent allocation for capitalprojects.

To statisticians, the 30 percent capital expenditure projection iseasily seen as an increment on the average 25 percent under theimmediate past administration of President Goodluck Jonathan, whosebudget hovered around N4.7 trillion year in year out.

But that’s just an easy reading. At N4.7 trillion, the nation was ableto pay its salaries and allowances. It was able to pay some level ofpensions and also undertake capital expenditure at about 25 percentannually.

At N6.06 trillion and now N7.2 trillion, without an increase insalaries and emoluments, the capital projections still stand at 30.7percent and recurrent votes still remain at 70.3 percent. Besides, theincumbent government told us it has applied IPPIS to detect ghostworkers and saved some N200 billion in salaries. It has also appliedon a wholesale scale the Treasury Single Account (TSA), saving enoughfunds that were being made available for use of the budget.

If the broad figures in the budget remain as they are, you would wantto ask; in what way is the budget going to work for the people? Somewould point to the provision of N500 million for social securityfunds; the recruitment of some teachers and the NPOWER project whichwill actualise some conditional cash transfers to the jobless.

No one will complain about those provisions, but there are too manyshock finds in the budget you hope should capture the attention of ourlawmakers.

An agency is proposing to spent N20million for the implementation ofFreedom of Information (FOI) Act, another is budgeting N21 million forreceiving of Tenders, this is aside the huge allocations thePresidency is budgeting on feeding and purchase of vehicles. One wouldwonder if all the equipment purchased for use in the presidency in theprevious administrations have all become obsolete and unusable.

But it is difficult for the lawmakers to fight this type ofcorruption. A Senator or a Rep member is a politician, who is moreconcerned about his personal benefits and benefits of hisconstituents.

His constituency offices are filled with hangers on, who are dailyturning in requests for assistant of various kinds. So when hereceives a bogus allocation from an agency, his instinct might be todemand “something, a cut for my people” rather than shout thief!

So who will rescue the budget? Maybe prayers.Maybe divine intervention.

I have been told that a president, no matter how young and erudite,cannot scrutinise the nearly 2,000 pages of the budget. True. But thepresident can search through all the pages of the budget of hisoffice, the Villa and the Presidency. If he sets the example fromthat, the other agencies might take a cue.

With what I have seen in the budget, I am convinced that the nation’srecurrent expenditure can conveniently be cut to 45 percent, whilecapital votes can jump to 65 percent. And you won’t need to performmagic to do that. What are the different agencies doing with purchaseand maintenance of computers on a yearly basis?  Why are we committingso much to foreign travels and tours? Even the cost of local travelsis not standardised. Why are some agencies committing two thirds oftheir recurrent votes to overheads? Why are we committing so much topurchase of vehicles on an annual basis? And why are the agencies not compelled to buy made (assembled) in Nigeria cars where necessary?

The government at the centre needs to think more of those who are notcaptured in the recurrent votes the civil servants toy with. Suchcategory of Nigerians can only look forward to a diligentimplementation of the capital votes. But that is the segment of thebudget that faces a herculean task in implementation. In 2016 the government released a little over N700 billion out of a capital voteof N1.7 trillion. We all know that release of funds is not the same asimplementation of projects. I cannot be the only Nigeria with fearsfor this seven trillion budget and the president as well as thelawmakers have a duty to address our fears.