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The Kogi State House of Assembly has passed the over N145 billion budget for the year 2022 into law.
The Lawmakers passed the budget on Thursday after the adoption of a Report of the Committee on Finance, Economic Planning and Budget Monitoring presented by its Chairman, Honourable Aderonke Aro, at the Committee of the whole house.
Honourable Aro maintained that Recurrent Expenditure gulped over N82bn while the Capital Expenditure has more than N63bn.
According to him, Personnel Cost has over N43bn with overhead cost having N38b representing 29 per cent and 26 per cent respectively.
The passing came at a time when the House of Assembly was accused of refusal to hold a public hearing on the budget.
The Executive Director of Conscience for Human Rights and Conflict Resolution (CHRCR), Idris Miliki had faulted the refusal of Kogi State House of Assembly to conduct a public hearing on the proposed 2022 budget.
Miliki, during a one-day meeting with civil society organization (CSO) partners and media, said denying the citizens access to the budget is fraudulent.
“To deny the citizens of Kogi state the right to contribute to the 2022 budget is fraudulent. Despite promises and the call on the State House of Assembly, there was still no public hearing on the 2022 budget estimates.
“The proposed 2022 Kogi state budget estimates allocated more fund for recurrent expenditure, rather than capital expenditure which is needed for infrastructure development,” he said.
Miliki insisted that there is a clear difference between budget defense and public hearing, which is currently ongoing.
However, the Speaker, Prince Matthew Kolawole, after presenting the progress report, passed the appropriation bill into law.
Recall that Governor Yahaya Bello on October 28th, 2021 presented 2022 budget proposal to the members of the state House of Assembly.
The budget which he tagged a “budget of accelerated recovery,” is in the sum of one hundred and forty-five billion, eight hundred and ninety six million, seventy-two thousand, nine hundred and thirteen naira (N145,896,072,913).
“The budget represents a decrease of N14,664,157,689 or 9.13% when compared with the 2021 Revised Budget,” the Governor stated.
He also disclosed a total estimated recurrent revenue of “N96,792,006,352 consisting of N23,266,375,259 from internal sources, N49,586,957,264 as State’s share from the Federation Account, N19,667,974,999 revenues from Value Added Tax (VAT), N100,000,000 from Excess crude, 1,000,000,000 from exchange difference, N500,000,000 as refund from Federal Government, N1,000,000,000 from Non-Oil Revenue, N200,000,000 from Forex Equalisation, N120,698,829 from Excess Bank charges, N350,000,000 from Budget Augmentation, N500,000,000 from Solid Minerals and N500,000,000 from Ecological Fund.
“Recurrent Revenue for the year 2020 stands at N96,792,006,352. Out of the above figure, the estimated personnel cost for the period is N45,119,725,532 whereas N45,031,565,719 is Overhead Costs, thereby giving N90,151,291,251 as a total recurrent expenditure for the year 2022.
“From the foregoing, we have a total estimated Transfer Surplus of N6,640,715,100 as Capital Development Fund.
“The estimated Capital Receipt is N49,104,066,562 comprising Capital receipts analysis by economic, Aids and Grants. However, if the Transfer Surplus of N6,640,715,100 is added to this amount, we shall have N55,744,781,662 as fund available for capital development projects.
Total estimated capital expenditure, therefore, stands at N55,744,781,662.
“In summary, our total estimated revenue (i.e. recurrent revenue and capital receipts) stands at N145,896,072,913 for the year 2022, making total estimated expenditure (i,e Recurrent and Capital) stands at N145,896,072,913 for the year 2022 making our 2022 Budget a balanced budget.
