In an apparent reaction to recent demand by the opposition for accountability regarding the management of oil subsidy removal income, the federal government has finally released a breakdown of the savings and gains of other reforms since the commencement of the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration on May 29, 2023.
Addressing a news conference on Wednesday, the Minister of Finance, Taiwo Oyedele, disclosed that the reforms resulted in N15.8 trillion in savings that accrued to the Federation Account.
While revealing that the savings were shared among the Federal Government, states and local governments, the Minister announced that the Federal Government received N5.43 trillion, while the states received N6.52 trillion whereas local governments received N3.88 trillion.
According to him, the reforms also generated N3.12 trillion in other incremental revenues and N11.85 trillion in incremental borrowing making it approximately N20.4 trillion in incremental resources during the period under review.
Oyedele, however, made public that additional expenditures incurred by the government during the same period amounted to approximately N30.64 trillion.
As he said, “The Federal Government had approximately N20.4 trillion in incremental resources.
“Over the same period, additional expenditures amounted to approximately N30.64 trillion. Subsidy removal therefore did not create one large pool of cash available to the Federal Government. It reduced a major fiscal burden and the amount of additional borrowing that would otherwise have been required”.
The Minister explained that of the N30.64 trillion in expenditures, N9.39 trillion was spent on wage adjustments, N9.37 trillion on external debt servicing, N6.47 trillion on infrastructure, and N3.14 trillion on electricity subsidies.
Hanto Daily News reports that reactions are expected from Economists, opposition leaders among other stakeholders.
