• Thursday, March 28, 2024
businessday logo

BusinessDay

Updated: 2021 budget: Buhari urges MDAs to deliver or get sanctioned

FG set for Kano-Maradi ground breaking despite criticisms

Amidst dwindling revenue and harsh economic conditions, President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday issued stern warning to agencies of government saddled with revenue generation to work hard to meet their targets or get sanctioned.

The president issued the warning when he signed N13.588 trillion 2021 Appropriation Bill and the 2020 Finance Bill into law.

The budget, which was passed by the National Assembly on December 21, 2020, comprises total Capital Supplementation of N1.06trn and total Capital Expenditure of N4.12trn. Statutory Transfer stands at N496bn; recurrent expenditure of N5.64trn,and Gross Domestic Product growth rate of 3.00 percent.

Buhari, who stated that his administration is intensifying domestic revenue mobilisation efforts for adequate resources to fund the 2021 budget, ordered revenue generating agencies and, indeed, all Ministries, Departments and Government-Owned Enterprises to work very hard to achieve their revenue targets, control their cost-to-revenue ratios, as well as ensure prompt and full remittance of revenue collections.

READ ALSO: Nigeria’s long walk to energy transition

“Relevant agencies are to ensure the realization of our crude oil production and export targets. Heads of defaulting agencies are hereby warned that they will be severely sanctioned. I also appeal to our fellow citizens and the business community, at large, to fulfil their tax obligations promptly,” he said.

President Buhari expressed his delight that despite disruptions occasioned by the coronavirus pandemic, the 2020 budget implementation passed previous thresholds.

“In spite of the adverse impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the nation’s economy and the government’s revenues, we have made appreciable progress in the implementation of the 2020 budget,” Buhari said.

“As at December 2020, we had released about one-point-seven-four-eight trillion naira (N1.748 trillion) out of a total of the one-point-nine-six-two trillion naira (N1.962 trillion) voted for the implementation of critical capital projects, representing a performance of about eight-nine-point-one percent (89.1 percent).

“The overall performance of the 2020 budget currently stands at an impressive rate of 97.7 percent. This commendable outcome underscores the importance of our efforts, together with the legislature, to return to the discipline of a January-to-December fiscal year. The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning will provide further details on the 2020 budget’s performance, in due course,” he said.

The president commended the National Assembly for completing “the important appropriation process in good time”, adding that “the passage of the 2021 Federal Budget before the commencement of the 2021 fiscal year is in confirmation of our resolve to maintain a predictable January-December fiscal year, as provided for in the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria”.