Budget office says non conformity with budget calendar disrupts economic activities
NAN-H-123
Conformity
By Kate Obande/Funmi Adeyemi
Abuja, Jan. 26, 2017 (NAN) Mr Ben Akabueze, Director General Budget Office of the Federation, on Thursday said non-conformity with budget calendar was responsible for the disruption of economic activities in the country.
Akabueze, said this while presenting a paper titled“ Development in the Nigeria Budgeting System’’ at seminar in Abuja organised by the Bureau of Public Service Reforms (BPSR) in collaboration with the European Union.
The DG, who defined budget as a tool for achieving governments’ socio-economic development goals, said that its process was expected to be concluded by the first of January every year.
“One of the key issues in the Nigeria budget system is the non-conformity with budget calendar.
“Budget processes are expected to be concluded and put in place by January 1, which is the beginning of the fiscal year, unfortunately this has not been the case in Nigeria due to various reasons.
“And its impact on the economy is adverse as it creates uncertainty and citizens cannot plan; it slows economic activities,’’ he said.
The DG also said that delay in budget implementation should be blamed for poor economic activities in the country, citing an example of the 2016 budget which its execution commenced in May 2016.
He explained that if budgets were approved in May, which is the beginning of rainy season, it means that construction workers and contractors cannot effectively carry out their jobs.
Akabueze added that if budgets were approved in January, the construction workers would have four months to do their road construction.
According to him, a country’s budget is aimed at poverty alleviation, employment generation, wealth creation, improvement in standard of living and general macro-economic stability.
He noted achieving these goals had become difficult in recent past due to inadequate and improper budget conceptualisation.
He further said that the bad revenue generation framework was a leading cause of poor economy, noting that there was a gap that must be bridged.
“Nigeria’s performance among the Mexico India Nigeria Turkey (MINT) and other selected African countries has worsened between 2000 and 2016.’
“This is because the method of revenue collection is lacking something; either they are not effectively collecting the revenue in terms of tax or they are collecting and not remitting to the government coffers,’’ he said.
Akabueze, however, noted that one of the reasons for poor revenue performance was Nigeria’s sole dependence of oil for revenue and foreign exchange.
Earlier in his remarks, the Director General, Bureau of Public Service Reforms (BPSR), Dr Joe Abah, said that the seminar was organised to hold government chief executives accountable for the reforms they were driving.
Abah said that the seminar provided them the opportunity to explain their efforts, justify their decisions and receive suggestions for improvement.
He acknowledged that suggestions received during previous seminars had helped to reshape policy development and implementation. (NAN)
KTE/FAK/DOR/AFA
Edited by Nyisom Dore/Felix Ajide