A civil society organisation,
BudgIT has named 12 states in the country that have allegedly refused to
publish their budgets.
BudgIT said the state governments
have proven that returns from budget secrecy are much more fulfilling to them
than the $750million incentive provided by the World Bank to encourage public
finance transparency in Nigeria.
In a statement on
Monday, BudgIT named Lagos, Cross River, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Ebonyi, Imo,
Nasarawa, Oyo, Rivers, Sokoto and Zamfara as States that are yet to publish
details of their 2019 budget online as of June 3rd, 2019, while Kwara State’s
budget went missing on its website immediately after the recent transition.
It added that, “An 8-month
painstaking effort, the assessment of the availability of public finance
documents in state government domains reveals that only twenty-five states’
approved budgets are available online, a few of which are summarized scanned
documents.
“This contravenes the ideals of
openness and transparency in the management of public resources, which is the
requisite guideline for the World Bank’s State Fiscal Transparency,
Accountability and Sustainability (SFTAS) programme, a product of mutual
agreement between the financial institution and the federal government to
strengthen fiscal transparency, accountability and sustainability in Nigerian
states as a means to turbocharge their revenue base, increase fiscal efficiency
in public expenditure while reducing debt overhangs.
“The project, in which all the 36
state governments submitted written expressions of interest, commenced late
2018 after the endorsement by the National Economic Council in March.
“It is shocking that any state
would jettison the offer of a programme that was informed by serious fiscal
challenges faced by states, the majority of which are still unable to pay
workers’ salaries and pensions.
“We must emphasise that Imo,
Zamfara and Sokoto states have not published their budget documents since 2017,
whereas Lagos State, which provides only a thumbnail of it, has a history of
notoriously resisting attempts to uncover its financial dealings, thus
embedding corruption.
“This situation notwithstanding,
BudgIT will not give in on its advocacy for transparency and accountability in
Nigeria.
“We shall look more critically at
the proactiveness in the disclosure of financial information by Nigerian states
as well as their compliance with the Freedom of Information Act,” said Gabriel
Okeowo, BudgIT’s Principal Lead.
According to him, “It is
commendable that many other states have released full budget documents to the
public.
“However, those documents must
always be published within a reasonable time-frame in an accessible format.
This is pivotal in enabling citizens to engage legislators during budget
debates.
“States with partially detailed
budget documents – in public domains – must provide details of capital projects
being executed for the fiscal year.”
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