The Federal Government of Nigeria must budget at least N15trn for 2019 (I)

PETITION TO THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY, MINISTRY OF BUDGET AND PLANNING, MINISTRY OF FINANCE, THE NIGERIAN PEOPLE

FROM MR. TOPE FASUA – PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE, ABUNDANT NIGERIA RENEWAL PARTY. (ANRP) – SEPTEMBER 2018

PREMISE:

It was to my utter shock on Tuesday 18th of September, 2018 when it was reported in the newspapers that the Federal Government of Nigeria (in its fiscal strategy paper) is planning a budget of N8.9 trillion for the people of Nigeria for the year 2019.

This proposal is problematic for several reasons;

In gross/absolute terms the 2019 budget is smaller than the budget for 2018 by over N200 billion. This means that from get go, Nigeria’s government is decidedly and deliberately taking Nigeria backwards, or promising clearly that Nigerians are in for tougher times next year.

Nigeria’s population grows at about 3% per annum. This means that an extra 5 to 6 million mouths are added to the responsibility of government each year. It is therefore unacceptable, and utterly wicked to provide less for these people.

Already the plans and dreams of the Nigerian government for WE the people is suboptimal and dismal in several respects, even when compared to what other countries – even in Africa – have as plans year on year for their own people. I will elucidate on this later. To plan to do less for a people is to confront the people with that planlessness and tell them to go to blazes

Yearly average food and other consumer inflation is about 13% in Nigeria. This means that N1million at the beginning of the year is a mere N870,000 at the end of the year. If we discount the proposed budget with the Consumer Price Inflation rate in order to find its REAL VALUE, the figure shrinks to about N7.7Trillion (at a conservative 13% average CPI per annum).

With this small dream the FGN has for Nigerians, there is no way it can grow the economy at the required ambitious rate or begin to reduce the numbers of the 90 million odd Nigerians  who live presently in extreme poverty according to the World Poverty Clock. The government is still the biggest spender in our economy (and there is nothing wrong with that because the government is empirically the biggest single spender in every economy). The ability for the government to spend appropriately not only reflates the economy but spurs growth in other sectors of the economy. As government shrinks its plans, other sectors of the economy will certainly shrink.

This 2019 proposal is being done along the usual lines. There is little responsibility or accountability in the budget. The budget is not performance or evidence-driven. As usual we are beginning another budgeting process where each item on the budget is an insertion by powers that be. Perhaps the reason for the reduction in both the absolute and real value of the budget is that the usual suspects are getting a bit tired of budget-padding and stealing. Their thinking revolves around what they’ve been used to and they cannot therefore imagine something totally different. However, it is also clear that they have no plans whatsoever for the people of Nigeria – young or old, strong or weak.

Already the 2018 budget is being implemented in breach. Little or No capital releases have been made. The budgeting process has become a joke, rather than the anchor of the Nigerian economy, and its hopes and dreams as it should be.

Figure 1 – Analysis of 2019 Budget Proposal vis-a-vis N15trillion people’s suggestion

Figure 1 above shows in a nutshell the shocking proposal of the FGN for Nigerians. Not only is the budget on the downward slide, the FGN expects revenue to fall by N840billion in 2019 – compared to the current year. Why should this happen? Are we going to be less productive, all of us? And if the government thinks so, what is it doing to avert this sad course? Equally, Nigeria hopes to increase deficit financing by N640billion. So what we have here is a plan for a multiple jeopardy. Not only is the budget smaller, and revenue projections even punier, but we intend to incurred a larger deficit of over $2billion additionally above the deficit we are running this year. In other words, Nigeria intends to move from a budget deficit of N1.9Trillion ($6Billion) in 2018, to a deficit of N2.59Trillion ($8billion) in 2019, while the total budget is even lower.

The implication of this is that all revenue agencies – according to this budget proposal – intend to go to sleep. Revenues drive budget and many African countries are doing far better than we are because of our capture and imprisonment by ‘entrenched interests’ who simply enjoy that 90million Nigerians remain in extreme and food poverty, that 15million children remain out of school, and that Nigeria remains the worst country on earth in terms of child and maternal mortality. A Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation report came out a few days ago to the effect that even in the year 2050 – 32 years away, 40% of all poor people on earth with be from Nigeria and DRCongo (this same report notes that the first wave of poverty eradication in modern times happened in China and the second is happening presently in India). This is a judgment call on our collective future that we must reject in all totality and the way to do that is to weigh in at this momentous time and reject this budget of hopelessness.