FG, States, LGAS share N4.55tn in nine months

The three tiers of government shared a total of N4.55tn between January and September this year as disbursements from the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee. According to the latest quarterly report of the Nigerian Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, released in Abuja on Wednesday, out of the N4.55tn that was shared in the review period, N1.76tn was disbursed in the third quarter as against the N1.38tn and N1.41tn shared in the second and first quarters of the year, respectively. 

It also showed that between January and September, the Federal Government received the highest allocation of N1.85tn, followed by state governments with N1.51tn and the 774 local governments with N913.8bn. The sum of N271.78bn went to the Department of Petroleum Resources, Nigeria Customs Service and the Federal Inland Revenue Service as costs of revenue collection. Further analysis showed that the revenues shared to the federating units were higher in the third quarter, a situation that has been the pattern for some years now. 

For instance, while the Federal Government got N549.41bn in the second quarter of 2017, the third quarter figure was N752.79bn, an increase of 37.02 per cent. The trend was the same for the states and local governments, as they received N586.58bn and N363.98bn in the third quarter as against N467.13bn and N280.42bn in the second quarter, respectively. 

The report noted that the percentage increases between the two quarters for the two tiers of government were 25.57 per cent and 29.8 per cent. It attributed the reason for the increases in FAAC disbursements to the three tiers of government in the third quarter to the positive developments in the oil sector occasioned by resurgent crude prices and increased production levels. 

The NEITI quarterly review report based its analysis on data obtained from FAAC, the National Bureau of Statistics, Federal Ministry of Finance and the Budget Office of the Federation. The report stated that the “upward trend in the FAAC disbursements to the three tiers of government are encouraging signs, which if sustained, will improve government expenditures, help to boost economic activities and move the country further away from recession.” 

(Punch)