The Lagos State Government has sensitised stakeholders on data gathering, collation, and uploading on Revenue Mobilisation Allocation Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) Data base in a bid to ensure that the State receives its rightful status in the Federation Account.
Speaking on Thursday at the event held at Ikeja, Rabiu Olowo, the state’s commissioner for finance, said the workshop is a follow-up to several stakeholder engagements held in the past to address the current Revenue Allocation Formula (RAF) that attributed ‘the lion share’ (52.68 percent) of our ‘commonwealth’ to the Federal Government while the balance is to be shared among other federating Units in a technically competitive manner.
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Olowo who was represented by Abiodun Muritala, Accountant General and Permanent Secretary of State Treasury Office (STO), reiterated the need to ensure equitable distribution of ‘National Wealth’ which is the key essence of democratic governance.
“The first most important phase in the sharing of federal allocation is the distribution among the three (3) tiers of government in a manner prescribed by the law,” he said.
“This is called the Vertical method of revenue allocation. Thus, the Federal government takes 52.68 percent, the State Government takes 26.72 percent, while the Local Governments is left with 20.60 percent. This seems unambiguous but clearly unequitable.”
According to him, the second phase is called the Horizontal method, and it involves the sharing of the amount (26.72 percent) allocated to State governments among all 36 States and the amount (20.60 percent) allocated to local governments among all 774 local governments.
“Under this method, a number of criteria (called indices) are applied to determine who gets what. These criteria include Population, Landmass, Revenue Efforts, Capacities of Public Health facilities, and capacities of Public schools,” he said.
Olowo said that the Lagos State Government has played its part by providing this opportunity (workshop), in addition to an unprecedented level of fiscal sustainability as well as shouldering immense federal responsibilities on infrastructural deficits.
Meanwhile, Hundogan Sewanu Temitope, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Finance, in his opening remarks, said the essence of the workshop is to receive guidance from RMAFC on the methodology, innovations to achieve the objectives of the workshop in particular and to enhance the revenue of the State in general.
