Business
ECA Drops To $2.45bn As FG, States Share N580bn
The Excess Crude Ac
count (ECA) has been further depleted by about $650 million from the $3.1 billion in December to $2.45 billion as at January 16, figures obtained from the Federation Account Allocation Committee by our correspondent has revealed.
According to the documents, the Minister of State for Finance, Amb Bashir Yuguda, while addressing journalists at the end of last month’s FAAC meeting in Abuja said the figures were reliable.
Also at the meeting, the committee shared the sum of N580.37 billion among the three tiers of government as allocation for the month of December.
The allocation of December of N580.37 billion is N108.56 billion lower than the budgeted amount less than the N628.77 billion shared in November.
Yuguda said that the shared amount comprised statutory revenue of N474.4 billion and N6.3billion being debt payment made by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation.
Other components of the allocation according to him, are Value Added Tax (VAT) of N73.5 billion and an additional N15.6 billion from the ECA was released to augment the shortfall in revenue generated during the period.
Giving a breakdown of revenue among the three tiers of government, Yuguda said the federal government received N220.5 billion representing 52.68 per cent, states, N111.8 billion, representing 26.72 per cent while the local governments got N86.2 billion or 20.60 per cent of the amount distributed.
He also disclosed that N47.2 billion representing 13 per cent derivation revenue was shared among the oil producing states.
The minister put the gross revenue received for the month of December at 490.03 billion, noting that the amount was lower than the N500.07 billion received in the previous month by N10.04 billion.
Yuguda said a 12 per cent drop in crude oil prices between the months of October and November last year had a negative effect on revenue accruing to the federal government.
The Chairman, FAAC Finance Commissioners Forum, Mr Timothy Odah, who also spoke at the end of the meeting expressed concern over the continued decline in revenue to the federation account.
He called for a more diversification effort by all levels of government to ensure that the drop in oil price does not affect government programmes.