Okonjo-Iweala lectures the Senate on 2012 budget implementation

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Published on Thursday, 02 August 2012 22:33

Written by Elombah.com

Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Nigeria, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, on Thursday appeared before the Senate to explain several issues regarding the 2012 budget implementation. The minister assured the lawmakers that the budget implementation was on course. Mrs Iwealla was also giving live updates of the Senate

hearing regarding Budget Implementation through her Twitter handle @NOIwealla. 

below is the summary of her testimony:

We have cut the administrative budget by N100 million to put the MDAs on their toes.

We may have temporary challenges because our main revenue earner, oil, is affected by the market but we are not broke.

The country is NOT broke. We are meeting our obligations.

The executive has nothing against well executed constituency projects.

We release resources to MDAs in bulk. There is no discrimination. We don't have a selective approach.

I will not ask for implementation of budget 2012 to extend till March next year. It's not good budgetary practice. We need to be disciplined

If you prorate the amount of budget. You'll get a figure of about N113billion per month.

To ensure that projects achieve the right results, good designs are important even for simple projects like boreholes.

We need to implement the budget within the year, that is January to December. Extending implementation to March isn't good practice

If you measure what's been implemented over the ENTIRE budget you get 13.7%. But becos we're talking about 4mnths, the implementation is 41%

We are not holding back any resources

Of that N404 billion, N184 billion has been utilized.

We started implementing the budget in April. So by now we should have released N446b. So far, we have released N404 billion.

The appropriations bill there is N1.3 trillion. When you add the SURE programme, you get 1.5 trillion. Non-SURE P budget is N1.3 trillion

I think that on the issue of budget execution, I have tried to be as clear as I possibly can.

We have made sure that salaries have been paid and that we are meeting other obligations

We have been working collaboratively with the National Assembly.

The budget must work for Nigerians. They must feel the impact. That is our focus.

56% of the funds that has been released has been used, meaning 44% is still available for implementation.

The Federal Ministry of Finance is not holding back any budgeted funds. The CBN can confirm that

56 percent of the capital budget has been utilised. 44 percent is still un-utilised. There is more room for utilisation.

The National Assembly and the Executive have to work together to improve the welfare of Nigerians.

Some of the constituency projects in the 2012 Budget are new and have not undergone the Proper Procurement Process, which takes time.

Mr President is personally leading the drive for higher budget performance.

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