2022 budget: Nigeria faces severe revenue crisis, dwindling foreign direct investments — BudgIT

Nigeria’s civic tech organisation that capitalises on raising the standards of transparency, citizen engagement and accountability most especially in public finance, BudgIT Nigeria has warned that Nigeria faces a severe revenue crisis over the recently submitted 2022 budget.

In the budget proposal analysis, BudgIT also predicted gross expenditures inefficiency, rising public debt, high unemployment and underemployment rates, dwindling foreign direct investments and development aid, insurgencies, and nationwide civil unrest.

The civil society organisation (CSO) issued the warning in a document titled “Leveraging Budget Reforms For Economic Development — Key Insights from FG’s 2022 Budget Proposal Analysis“.

In an attending note, BudgIT shared two important publications that citizens, CSOs and the media need to aid effective engagement with the government on budget reform issues .

The first is an analysis of the proposed 2022 Budget which highlighted Nigeria’s progress with budget reforms in the last two years and grey areas that need to be checked to improve macroeconomic stability.

The second is a list of all the frivolous, suspicious and inflated items in the proposed 2022 Budget.

Proposed 2022 Budget Analysis: Reform issues and solutions for curbing corruption loopholes

The economic and financial watchdog noted that the early submission of Nigeria’s proposed 2022 Federal Government spending plan of N16.39 trillion to the National Assembly is a commendable feat.

“This gives adequate room for public debate and ample time for oversight by the National Assembly,” it said.

From its experience with analysing the budget, BudgIT stressed that Nigeria is battling fiscal risks that threaten the country’s macroeconomic stability and long-term fiscal sustainability.

“Nigeria faces a severe revenue crisis, gross expenditures inefficiency, rising public debt, high unemployment and underemployment rates, dwindling foreign direct investments and development aid, insurgencies, and nationwide civil unrest.

“How the government allocates scarce resources to solve these issues through the budget ultimately affects the quality of life every Nigerian can experience in 2022,” the CSO said.

In light of the challenges above, BudgIT analysed the 2,168 page 2022 federal budget document, to review the country’s current macroeconomic issues.

It highlighted the critical budget reform issues, revenue projections, expenditure analysis across sectors and recommendations that can be implemented in the short term to minimize loopholes for corruption before the budget is signed into law.

The the budget proposal analysis document was equally sent to state actors and stakeholders at the National Assembly, hoping that they would implement the recommendations.

The full document can be downloaded here.

BudgIT calls on FG to remove frivolous items from the proposed budget

Still on the proposed budget, BudgIT carefully looked through the document to identify the frivolous, suspicious and inflated items that should be removed or reduced.

The said items, it noted, do not only make the budget unnecessarily bloated, they also reduce the amount of public funds available for real capital infrastructure projects.

With a current deficit of over N6 trillion, BudgIT expressed belief that a review of these line items will drastically reduce this deficit.

Topping the list of these items is a whopping N3.78 billion allocated for refreshments, which it considered inflated, considering an additional N176 billion allocated for “meals for government schools and institutions” in the budget.

BudgIT also flagged the N21.9 billion allocation for the construction of the presidential wing at the statehouse medical centre.

This, according to the organisation, is because the sum of N395 million, N416 million and N1.06 billion were allocated to construct the same state house medical centre in 2019, 2020 and 2021 budgets, respectively.

“It is questionable that this wing still needs N21.9 billion in the 2022 budget.

“In the light of this, we sent a copy of this list to all National Assembly members, including the principal officers.

“We look forward to seeing adjustments before President Buhari passes the budget.

“We also call on the citizens, media and CSOs to join us in calling for the removal of these items for the country’s greater benefit,” BudgIT stated.

The full list can be downloaded here.

News Band had, on October 7, 2021, reported that President Muhammadu Buhari presented the 2022 Appropriation Bill, tagged Budget 2022, to the joint session of the National Assembly, that is the Senate and the House of Representatives.