…Okonjo-Iweala, others to appear before public hearing
The House of Representatives yesterday demanded a full disclosure of the state of the nation's Federation Account from the Federal Government.
The House also mandated three committees to conduct a public hearing on the full disclosure of the Federation Account.
This is even as former Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar lent his voice to agitations by states and local governments for improved revenue sharing formula.
The lawmakers said the public hearing was geared toward finding out the exact economic situation in the country.
The committees to carry out the assignment are Finance, Appropriation, Loans and Aids.
The House said that the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, heads of revenue yielding agencies and other related organisations were expected to be at the hearing.
The resolution followed a motion by Hon. Bimbo Daramola (APC- Ekiti), which was adopted by the House when put to vote by the Speaker, Aminu Tambuwal.
The motion is entitled: "Need for Full Disclosure of the State of Account of the Federation Account and Economic Situation of our Country."
Daramola, while arguing on the merit of the motion, said: "The Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in Section 162(1) provides that the federation shall maintain a special account called the Federation Account."
He said that Section 162(3) stated that any amount standing to the credit of the Federation Account shall be distributed among the federal, state and local governments in terms prescribed by the National Assembly.
"The benchmark in the 2013 appropriation is $79 per barrel, and till date oil sales has not fallen below $100 per barrel," he noted.
According to him, the past three to four months have witnessed exchanges between the Minister of Finance and the state governors over partial releases of the allocation from the Federation Account due to the states.
He expressed concern that some state governments were already unable to meet their statutory responsibilities such as payment of salaries due to the non release of their allocations.
According to him, despite profuse reassurances from the Minister of Finance that the economy is growing and government is meeting all obligations when due, the situation remains unchanged.
"There are manifest scenarios in the country such as the non-remittance of full amounts due to states and improper funding or fund releases for capital projects," Daramola said.
Speaking in support of the motion, Hon. Ibrahim Gusau (APC-Zamfara) urged the House to do what is "right" as representatives of the people.
Chairman, House Committee on Appropriation, Hon. John Enoh (PDPCross/ River), and Hon. Farouk Lawan (PDPKano), who spoke during the debate, also supported the motion.
Lawan said: "It is obvious that this House needs to find out about the management of our economy."
The motion was not opposed and was referred to the relevant committees for more action.
General Abubakar, who spoke when a delegation of the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission, RMAFC visited him as part of its nationwide consultation on the new revenue sharing formula project in Abuja, also called on the Federal Government to hands off from certain responsibilities that ordinarily are better handled by the sub-national governments.
This is even as the RMAFC re-assured Nigerians that a new revenue sharing formula that will be fair, just and credible will be released before the end of this year.
Abubakar's comments came along those earlier made by elder statesmen and leaders and civil society groups calling for improved revenues, particularly for local governments, in order to ensure socioeconomic development at the grassroots and by implication, reduce poverty level in the country.
Making his own submission before the delegation, Abubakar said states and local governments should get more allocation from the Federation Accounts in view of their roles in development.
For instance, the former Head of State canvassed the need for the Federal Government to ensure devolution of responsibilities in some sectors like education and others that could be better handled at sub-national level and touch directly on the welfare of the citizens at the grassroots.
He said: "I agree with Nigerians that the Federal Government is taking too much responsibility. I will rather see an undilution of the activities of the Federal Government. For example, Federal Government has nothing to do with secondary school education and neither does the state governments. I think this is the responsibility of our local government areas.
"And I think the earlier we start thinking of rationing what our local, state and federal governments do, I think we are now on a certain point that will help RMAFC to make their recommendations on the way forward to share this revenue," Abubakar advocated.
On the criterion of using population as one of the determinants of who gets what in revenue allocation, the former Head of State believes that that remained a logical option in view of the fact that revenues are meant to be used to meet the needs of the governed, adding that "when you are doing allocation, you look at the number of people you are allocating for, where these people are; you then decide how you are going to distribute.".
Speaking on the outcome of the interactive session, the RMAFC delegation had with the former Head of State, the Chairman of the Commission, Engr. Elias Mbam, said the parley was fruitful as members were better informed on issues that would ultimately determine the outcome of the ongoing exercise.
According to him, the visit availed members of the delegation the opportunity to learn more about the materials that they needed to put into use for the exercise and assured that by the time the Commission finished ongoing consultations and all the inputs from all Nigerians were considered, the new revenue formula will reflect the issues of the people and will also be sustainable.
Mbam said the promise to deliver a new formula this year remained sacrosanct and that the commission would work on the various inputs from stakeholders and its own findings on the field to meet the deadline earlier set for completion of the project.
