‘How states, LGs concoct figures on revenue sharing’

Some states and local governments concoct figures to mislead the Revenue Mobilization Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), the agency tasked with the revenue sharing formula of the federation, a House of Representatives panel has heard.

The two tiers of government engage in the act to gain undue advantage in getting higher revenue allocations, the acting chairman of the commission, Shettima Umar Abba Gana said.

He told an ad-hoc panel of the House investigating data collection processes, maintenance and usage by the RMAFC that the commission faces daunting task in dealing with such figures.

He said the commission goes the extra mile by verifying from independent sources such as the Federal Ministry of Education and the Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) to get the true situation of things.

“Most of these challenges are caused by the attempt by states and local governments to gain undue advantage over others by providing the commission with unrealistic figures.

“In addition, some states and local governments may not even submit the required data to the commission at all. In such cases the commission will be left with no option than to give such local governments the national average,” he told the panel headed by Mark Gbillah (APC, Benue).

Gbillah picked holes in the commission’s resolve to allocate national average to states that do not provide any data “knowing full well that it’s outrageous.”

Based on the current national revenue sharing formula, which has been on since 2004, the Federal Government takes 52.68 per cent, 36 states get 26.72 per cent, while the 774 local governments take 20.60 per cent.

Responding to a question from a member of the panel, Muhammad Usman (APC, Kaduna), Abba Gana said some states even provide data on hard copies instead of soft copies.

The lawmakers demanded all correspondences between the commission and such states on the matter.