Politics

Reps summon Finance Minister, others over under-declaration of revenue

The House of Representatives, on Friday, accused all Government Owned Enterprises (GOEs) of under-declaration of revenues remitted into the Federation Account for 2023 fiscal year.

Chairman, House Committee on Appropriations, Hon. Abubakar Bichi, who expressed the concern during pre-2024 budget defence interactive session with heads of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), turned back representatives of Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), among others.

Hon. Bichi who expressed grave concern over the economic challenges triggered by high inflation rate and foreign exchange rate, underscored the need for heads of various GOEs to ensure physical appearance before the Standing Committee.

Hon. Bichi noted that reducing the burden of Nigeria’s debt profile, sectoral budgetary allocations, and the dynamics of budget releases, economic diversification strategies, revenue generation forecasts is needed to facilitate the enactment of the bill and effective implementation of the Appropriations Act, 2024.

To this end, the Committee chairman summoned Government Owned enterprises to include the minister of Finance, FIRS, NUPRC, NCC, CG Customs, NNPC, NPA, NIMASA, Minister of State for Petroleum, the CBN Governor among others to appear in person on Monday 10 am prompt.

He said: “The essence of this interactive is to see how we can bring more revenues from GOEs so that this budget can be more useful for our people.

“As I said earlier, 27 trillion may look big but inflation, exchange rate, so, the 27 trillion for this year is almost 20 trillion for last year as we all know. So we really have to discuss with the GOEs. All these NIMASA, NPA, NNPCL, that’s the reason we called the Minister of Petroleum, NUPRC, we need them here.

“We need them here to shed more light about their declarations because the declarations, we felt that is not enough. It’s not enough because if you consider some critical projects which have been captured in this budget, some critical roads and critical power projects and all of that.

“You can see a project of 100-kilometer road, worth 50, 60 billion contract sum but they only have N1 billion in the budget. That means it will take some 40, 50 years to complete it. Look, we need to sit down these GOEs, there’s need to come up with more money.

“They must come up with more money so that we can support Mr. President, we have seen what he did in Lagos, he has done a lot. We believe he wants to do the same in Nigeria as well as the President. But without money there’s no magic, there’s nothing he can do.

“That’s the reason we said we’ve studied the budget, fantastic budget, brilliant but we need funding from GOEs, their declarations honestly are not enough. Let them come to show us because we need to analyze it.

“So, we are expecting the honourable Minister of Finance, because I believe that he’s going to give us more information in respect of the 2023 releases, IGR collected as well as 2024 projection. That’s the reason why we are expecting him to come,” Hon. Bichi stressed.

In his response, Minister of Budget & National Planning, Abubakar Bagudu observed that: “the International investors are looking at the signals we are making. Because somebody will say why will I give you money if you throw yours away.

“So that’s why it’s even more important for all of us to work together and ensure that we interrogate all because of those inefficiencies.

“Today, there’s an investment manager somewhere in the world sitting on top of $11 trillion. He’s looking for where to put the money. We have sovereign wealth fund, in UAE who are sitting on top of over a trillion dollars. So, we need budget that they can trust in, that they can say let’s invest in Nigeria.”

While noting that Mr. President is already leading the investment drive despite antagonistic comments on the travel expenses, he stressed the need for Nigeria to interrogate and examine the laws that may limit investors from putting money into the country’s economy.

The committee had turned back representatives of CBN, Customs, FIRS, and demanded their heads to appear.

Earlier in his address, the Minister who observed that Nigeria being one of the 10 most populous countries in the world has the smallest budget, applauded the ambitious target set by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to raise the country’s GDP from 10 percent to 18 percent.

According to him, the “global revenue that revenue that we collect as a proportion of GDP is about 10 percent. Mr. President has expressed confidence, the directive that we must raise it to at least 18 percent. 18 percent is big but still lower than the global average.

“We should together embrace the opportunity that God has presented us with, a leader who understands the world. who can lead us to find the hundreds of billions of dollars that we require to transform this country and urgently enough so that it works for everyone?

“We have 27 trillion budget but what is most important that budget came about because of choices that we made. Good choices. Mr President from day one said we are done with fuel subsidy and that has helped in achieving something. Equally, the foreign exchange regime has been liberalised and that is why we are even able to present an N27 trillion budget, otherwise, we wouldn’t and DMO I think she has stretched her patience with us, so maybe tell you more of that.

“We have taken important steps and we are turning the bend because, in the budget proposal we are presenting, the deficit is declining. That is one major indices that is watched by experts around the world. Last year 2023 deficit the GDP ratio was 6.11 percent. This 2024 it is forecast to be 3.88. That is a significant decline.

“Even again with the reduction in the deficit, the 2024 proposal before you also has increased spending even when adjusted for inflation, especially in those areas that we are promised in the 8-point agenda of renewed hope. Education spending has gone up in real terms from about 5 percent to about 9.5 percent of the budget.

“The same thing with health spending, defence spending, infrastructure spending. They have all gone up. In this budget, you will see that the national agriculture development fund that this Chamber together with the Senate passed is to create a fund for sustainable funding of agriculture in this budget appropriation we have provided the sum of N100 billion for the take-off of the fund.

“Equally you will see in the budget provision the sum of N100 billion for consumer credits because countries that have extended economic activity that we are trying to learn from do so by ensuring that consumer demand is high and consumer credit availability determines consumers so that our manufacturing sector would worry less about demand but more about production efficiency.

“Equally in this budget, we have an N65 billion proposal to support the expansion of mortgages so that the housing sector which many countries have used to boost economic activity can also grow. Equally, we have provided the sum of N50 billion for student loans.

“Of course, we are under no illusion that these sums of money can provide all the funding that is required but these are catalytic and game-changing because they are courtesy of your legislation. And they will crystallize more funding to those sectors because we propose them to be sustainable, so they can grow with time and in so doing we would solve for our young men and women for those in the agricultural space, the financing. Financing would no longer an issue but Innovation and competitiveness.

“With your support we will generate more revenue and fund our dreams. we would invite internet capital as well as domestic capital to invest more in our economy,” the Minister urged.

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