N455bn Unaccounted For In 2019 Budget – Report

 

N455bn Unaccounted For In 2019 Budget – Report

A report by a civic-tech organisation fostering public accountability in Nigeria, Paradigm Leadership Support Initiative (PLSI), has shown that 20 per cent of the 2019 budget was not implemented, with N455 billion not accounted for in 70 Ministries Departments and Agencies of government (MDAs).

The organisation noted that at the moment, the audit reports of 2020 and 2021 were yet to be presented to the National Assembly, hence the need for the federal government to speed up the process of enacting modern audit law to limit waste and inefficiency in management and utilisation of public funds in the country.

Presenting the report during a press briefing in Abuja on Monday, the executive director, PLSI, Olusegun Elemo, explained that while approved budget for all the 70 agencies analysed was N3.79trn, funds released to the MDAs in 2019 stood at N2.2tn.

Elemo, however, said the sum of N455.14bn (20.69 per cent of funds released in 2019) was not unaccounted for by the agencies.

He said government institutions covered in PLSI’s analysis included “Federal Medical Centre, Keffi which was unable to account for N17.7bn, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development with N60.6bn not accounted for, Federal Ministry of Works and Housing yet to account for N1.2bn, Anambra-Imo River Basin Development Authority Owerri with N5.85bn, Bank of Agriculture with N350m, Code of Conduct Tribunal with N516.5m, Council for Legal Education (Nigeria Law School) with N4.4bn.”

Others, according to him, were “Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) with N275.6m, Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) with N5.1bn and 61 other agencies of government.”

He said a total of 394 audit issues, 603 risks on public finance management, 342 management responses and 1,528 audit recommendations were drawn from the 2019 Audit Report.

Elemo explained that in analysing the 2019 Audit Report of the Federation, the group linked government agencies’ budgetary provisions in 2019 to actual funds released.

He also said they provided insight into the proportion of funds released that has not been accounted for by 70 ministries, departments and agencies of the Federal Government.

“The ball is now in the ‘court’ of the National Assembly and its Committees on Public Accounts to ensure everyone queried in the report of the Auditor-General are made to respond to such queries and make sure missing public funds are recovered back to government treasury,” he added.

He further mentioned that, “it is sad that the Federal Government of Nigeria has since 2015 refused to enact a new audit legal framework to strengthen the Office of the Audit-General for the Federation and enhance the fight against corruption which President Muhammadu Buhari committed to.”

He stressed that the federal government should cease relying on the 1956 Audit Ordinance Act and take a cue from subnational governments in the country, many of which enacted progressive audit legal frameworks between June and December 2021.

“It is certainly not a herculean task if leaders are committed to prudent management of public resources especially the face of persistent revenue shortfall and increasing debt burden,” he said.

He also emphasised the need to leverage the potency of public sector audit instruments to improve transparency and accountability in the management and utilisation of public funds in Nigeria.