…As FAAC revenue shrinks by N52.1bn in April
Oscarline Onwuemenyi
25 May 2017, Sweetcrude, Abuja – Nigeria’s Excess Crude Account balance dropped to $2.29 billion on May 23 from $2.49 billion on April 25.
The Accountant General of the Federation, Mr. Ahmed Idris, made this known while addressing journalists at the end the Federation Account Allocation Committee, FAAC, meeting held at the Ministry of Finance in Abuja.
According to Idris, the allocations from the Federation Account to the three tiers of government also declined by N52.07 billion from the N467.8 billion shared in March to N 415.73 billion in April this year.
Idris, who represented the Minister for Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, told journalists in Abuja that the N415.7 billion was distributed under four sub-heads.
“The distributable revenue for the month is N272.1 billion. The sum of N6.33 billion was refunded by NNPC. There is also a proposed distribution of N20.42 billion from the excess Petroleum Profit Tax.
“Also, exchange gain of N38.5 billion is proposed for distribution. Therefore, the total revenue distributable for the current month, including VAT of N81.2 billion is N415.7 billion”, she said.
Similarly, a decrease of N57.47 billion was also recorded in gross statutory revenue from N331.58 billion in March to N274.1 billion in April.
Mr. Idris explained further that the Federal Government received N163.89 billion while states and the 774 local government councils received N117.59 billion and N87.77 billion, respectively.
Meanwhile, N29.83 billion was shared to the oil-producing states based on the 13 per cent derivation principle, while the revenue- generating agencies received N16.52 billion as the cost of revenue collection.
He added that the decrease in revenue to crude oil production setbacks was caused by sabotage and shutdown of installations, especially in the Niger Delta region.
“Despite the improvement (in prices of crude oil), production still suffered the perennial setbacks,” he said.
He said government generated N177.7 billion as mineral revenue, which showed a reduction of N50 billion from the N228.5 billion generated in March.
Similarly, in April, the non-mineral revenue also reduced by N6.6 billion, from the N103 billion the country generated in March.
Idris said after deducting the cost of collections to the revenue generating agencies, the federal government got N124.4 billion, states N63.1 billion and local government councils N48.7 billion.
In addition, she said N22 billion was given to the oil producing states based on the 13 per cent derivation principle.
On the balance of the excess crude account, the Accountant-General said the account currently stands at 2.45 billion dollars.
Despite the increase in revenue generated for the month, the federal government drew attention to the decrease in crude oil export volume.
Idris said that despite government effort, crude oil production still suffered setbacks. She said there were continued leakages arising from sabotage of oil pipelines.
Also, the Chairman, Forum of Finance Commissioners in Nigeria, Mr. Mahmoud Yunusa said states were also committed to increasing their internal revenue generation in line with the federal government’s recovery and growth plan.
He decried the low allocation, saying that it may not be enough for some states to pay their salaries.
