NEWS: NIGERIA - Leakages: Buhari orders ministers to monitor MDAs

President Muhammadu Buhari has further tightened the noose on Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to plug revenue leakages, by ordering the ministers to monitor them closely.

The directive was given yesterday at the first meeting of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) for this year inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

Briefing State House correspondents at the end of the meeting which lasted about an hour, the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed and his Finance counterpart, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, denied reports that the 2016 budget had been withdrawn from the National Assembly, explaining, however, that it is a normal process worldwide that amendments could be made on the document when it is being defended.

This is even as the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) has been allegedly indicted as being among the agencies remitting Naira instead of dollars into government coffers.

Speaking on plugging of leakages, Adeosun said Buhari charged the ministers to be mindful of their responsibilities as enshrined in the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) and keep the MDAs under check.

She said the Federal Government had discovered that many revenue-generating agencies have not be remitting the revenues generated to government’s coffers.

She noted that it was also discovered that some of the agencies spend government money without control.

“The principal discussion in our meeting today was the initiative by this administration to plug revenue leakages in our MDAs that generate revenue. The presentation to FEC was to remind ministers who supervise these revenue-generating boards of their responsibilities under the Fiscal Responsibility Act.

“Let me remind you that under FRA, these boards and corporations which generate revenue are supposed to generate and operate surplus, 80 per cent of which is to be credited to the Consolidated Revenue Fund.

“But we have discovered that many agencies have never credited anything and never generated any operating surplus including some whose salaries, overheads, capital are paid by the Federal Government. In addition to that, they generate revenue which they spend without any form of control,” she said.

Adeosun said one of the initiatives adopted by the government was the directive to all the agencies that they must all submit budgets that must be subject to approval and they must operate within budgets so that the surplus is meant to come to the Federal Government can be seen to be used as appropriate.

She explained that these are revenues of government in non-oil economies but the government had not been looking in the direction of the MDAs in the past because the country had oil.

She disclosed that a circular had been issued to the agencies in their hundreds last month requesting that they send in their budgets.

“What we discussed today (Wednesday) was the responsibility of the ministers to ensure that whether those agencies have boards or not, those budgets are prepared that the Ministry of Finance is going to sit down with the supervising ministers and with the boards concerned where necessary to go through their budgets and make sure that they are reasonable, that the costs are not inflated.

“We also discussed that in some cases, because some agencies have a track record and history of making sure that every Naira they earned is spent, that we will go in and audit agencies under Section 107 (8) of the Financial Regulations.

On agencies generating revenue in foreign currency but remitting Naira, Adeosun also said the government had done a comprehensive audit of those that collect money in foreign currency and remit in Naira.

She said the requirement was that such monies should go to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) which should exchange the money into Naira.

Adeosun said while the government had stopped the agencies that have been found to be doing so, an audit is being carried out to identify other agencies.

The minister said although the government had identified NIMASA as the alleged culprit, it has also discovered that there are other agencies, including foreign missions, that have not been identified.

Adeosun also denied reports that the President had withdrawn the 2016 Budget from the National Assembly.

She, however, said it is a normal process worldwide that amendments could be made on the document during defence process.

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