Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) has raised concern that some identified ambiguous provisions in the 2019 budget estimates have the capacity to stifle Nigeria economic growth as well as serve as an avenue for corruption to thrive.
Eze Onyekpere, lead director, CSJ, said exclusively to BusinessDay that filling the budget with ambiguous provisions as identified in some line item in the 2019 budget estimates prevent the budget from focusing on the critical issues affecting the economy and the populace, adding that it also distorts prioritisation and promote diversion of resources from the areas of need to less important issues.
“The frivolous and inappropriate provisions made in the budget provides opportunities for corrupt activities to thrive, when budgetary provisions can only be understood by the exact persons who placed them in the budget, it means that citizens’ oversight through monitoring and evaluation will not be possible,” Onyekpere said.
Speaking on the current state of the Nigerian economy, Onyekpere explained, “The economic growth can not match the population growth neither is it sufficient to create jobs for the rising jobless population in the country,” adding that it had provided the justification for the continued increase of local and foreign indebtedness because we were channelling scarce resources to inappropriate expenditure while seeking to borrow for capital funding.
“The Nigerian economy is not growing at a rate that matches the population growth, neither is it growing sufficiently to create jobs for the teeming youth bulge. The economy fails to produce the quantum and quality of goods and services required to meet the needs of the society,” he said.
It would be noted that the department and agencies of the Federal Government are currently doing budget defence, Onyekpere had however identified ambiguities in budgetary provisions in certain specific line items.
“We have statutory transfer, which contain a lump sum provision without details for National Assembly, human rights commission, public complaints commission, Niger delta development commission as well as the national judicial council.
“NDDC has a vote of N95.118 billion; Ministry of Niger Delta get N41.60 billion while the Amnesty programme has a vote of N65 billion, which sums up to N201.789 billion. The Niger Delta master plan should be the basis of budgeting instead of the current uncoordinated approach.”
Raising further concern on the Niger Delta budget, he pointed out that the allocation and investment in the region should be streamlined to address holistic needs of the people.
Onyekpere speaking further noted that the agricultural sector allocated huge sums for unexplained value chain as well as many research institutes and centres with weak extension service, stressing that the research institutes get repeated sum year after year, which had not improved the outcome of the sector.
“No one can monitor a project or program without location, known activities and deliverables. So, money will be spent on projects that deliver no value. The third is that inappropriate provisions distort the link between the budget and official policies. But policies should find resonance in the budget.”
