Akwa Ibom, Rivers, Delta Are Among 10 States Accounted For Highest Federation Account Allocations – Okonjo-Iweala
The Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has named top 10 recipients of Federation Account allocations in 2013.
Okonjo-Iweala said this on Sunday, June 1, while delivering a commencement address at the 12th convocation ceremony and award of degrees to graduating students of Babcock University, Ilishan Remo, Ogun State.
According to the minister, the top 10 allocations in 2013 went to the following states (the data do not include internally generated revenue of these states):
"Many Nigerian states receive revenue allocations which are larger than the budgets of neighbouring countries such as Liberia ($433 million), Gambia ($210 million) or Benin Republic ($1.47 billion). The top two recipients of state allocations – Akwa Ibom and Rivers – received $3.2 billion combined, which is about half of the entire budget of Ghana (about $6.4 billion)," Okonjo-Iwela pointed out.
On a per capita basis, the top three recipients last year were Bayelsa (N84,500 or $545), Akwa Ibom (N55,600 or $360) and Delta (N42,000 or $270).
Okonjo-Iweala observed that some states – even those with relatively small resources – happen to achieve more than others in term of provision of public services, while the federal government still bears the biggest responsibility in many sectors.
"We know from the constitution that the provision of many public services such as health, education, agricultural services fall under the concurrent list and so are the joint responsibilities of federal, states and local governments. "However, it appears most responsibilities, from immunisation to supply of agricultural inputs, have now been pushed solely to the federal government."
"It is clear from these analyses that we should be expecting more from our states and local governments.School enrollment rates appear to have improved in Anambra and Gombe States. Jigawa State has also worked to improve its infrastructure, same as in Ekiti and Ondo that have done very well in health care, while Lagos has been able to open up its environment," the minister said. "But many others are still lagging behind when you look at provision of basic public services such as primary health care, education, community infrastructure and so on," she added.
Okonjo-Iweala called on the Nigerians to hold their state and local governments accountable "just as we hold the federal government to account".
"So you see that our top 10 states receive more money than [neighboring] countries and, therefore, you should be asking what is this money being used for?"
The minister also said that Nigeria is challenged by the absence of a sustainable social contract in which every citizen could agree on some standard norms of behaviour within local communities, work places, civil society groups and ultimately, the nation.
"For example, look at the power sector. Government may work tirelessly to invest in laying pipelines to deliver gas to power plants. But the next moment, some of our own citizens go ahead and vandalise this infrastructure for their narrow personal and political interests."
Ngozi-Iweala gave other examples of "vandalism" embedded into the lack of social contract such as crude oil stealing, vandalism of telecoms base stations, stealing of solar panels on highways, kidnappings for ransoms, abduction of schoolgirls, and killing of our fellow citizens as Boko Haram.
"Is this the way to treat our fellow citizens and to deliver on a social contract among all Nigerians? Nigerians need to show a degree of outrage at those perpetrating such acts," she stressed.
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Source: Legit.ng
