21 states yet to publish 2018 budgets –Report

As the debate between the executive and the legislature over which arm of the Federal Government was responsible for the late passage of the 2018 budget continues to simmer, findings by the civic organisation, BudgIT, have revealed that only 15 out of the country’s 36 states have published their budgets for this year.

In a statement issued yesterday, the organisation identified Borno, Delta, Edo, Ekiti, Gombe, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kogi, Kwara, Lagos, Nasarawa, Ondo, Plateau and Yobe as States that have published their 2018 budgets online.

It, however, noted that only 13 of these states’ budgets (Borno, Delta Edo, Ekiti, Gombe, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kogi, Nasarawa, Ondo, Plateau and Yobe) are sufficiently detailed, “while Lagos and Kwara states provided a summary of their budgets on the government websites.”

According to the statement: “BudgIT is currently conducting its #StateofStates campaign which examines the level of transparency in the 36 Nigerian States. In its online assessment on the availability of public finance documents in State government domains, we observed that as at June 20, 2018, only 15 States in the country had published their budget documents online.

“It is instructive to note that only 13 states (Borno, Delta Edo, Ekiti, Gombe, Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kogi, Nasarawa, Ondo, Plateau and Yobe) of the 15 states are sufficiently detailed, while Lagos and Kwara states provided a summary of their budgets on their respective government websites. The document provided lacks actionable detail with which citizens can hold their elected officials to account. Our organisation would like to state explicitly that Lagos and Kwara States have a history of opacity over the years and are notorious for resisting attempts by citizens to pry into the affairs of the state.”

The civic organisation further stated that: “Shrouding public finance information in secrecy thereby encourages corruption and mediocre performance in the states. The #StateofStates advocacy continues to critically look at the proactiveness in the disclosure of information in the Nigerian states and their compliance with the Freedom of Information law where applied. Transparency in the states continues the downward swing as governments persist in denying citizens the access to relevant information.”

It pointed out that while it was commendable that 13 states released full budget documents to the public, these must be published within a reasonable timeframe.

“The proposed budget details presented to the state House of Assembly should be made available to the public to enable them to engage their Legislators during the budget debate. Any state keen on citizen participation in governance should publish full details of the proposal with 48 hours of submission to the legislature,” BudgIT stated.

The organisation’s Project Manager, Abayomi Akinbo, observed that: “Information on government spending from the public purse should be provided to the people by government through various communication channels; one of which is the official state website. However, this is not the case with State governments in Nigeria.”

BudgIT stressed that: “Beyond the release of pictures and stories of projects executed, it is vital that citizens are informed of project cost to enable them to decide if the project delivered optimum value for money spent. Nigeria battles the current scourge of corruption due to the prevailing practice of opacity at federal, state and local levels. No country achieves transparency and accountability without the active participation of citizens in the management of its resources. Taxpayers must hold government accountable to enable them to enjoy the dividends of democracy.”

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