The Federal Capital Territory is unique in many perspectives. It is the capital and the seat of the government of the Federation. The constitution said it should be treated as if it is a state in Nigeria, yet the legislative, executive and the judicial powers vest in the National Assembly, the President of the Federation and in the courts which are established for the Federal Capital Territory respectively. Consequently, the ownership of all lands comprised in the Federal Capital Territory vests in the Federal Government and such lands are held in trust and administered for the use and common benefit of all Nigerians. Every Nigerian is entitled to a plot of land in the FCT and this makes the territory the home for all.
As the capital of Nigeria it houses the three arms of government which are the Presidential Villa, the Supreme Court and the National Assembly Complex. It is the headquarters of all the political parties and most of the NGO’s and businesses in Nigeria. The headquarters of most of the embassies of foreign countries and international organisations in Nigeria, the chief amongst them being the United Nations. Whatever happens in the FCT touches everybody and instantly reverberates around the world. It affects our image either positively or negatively and this determines the level of the international investors’ confidence in us. The idea is that if you cannot be protected in the capital of the country, where else will you be protected? If the capital of the country is not developed, which part of the country is developed?
This uniqueness of the FCT extends to the budgetary system of allocation of resources for the development of the FCT. Strictly speaking, the FCT operates two budgets, the National Priority budget and the Statutory budget. The National Priority Budget of the FCT is part of the budget of the Federal Government, which the President presents before the National Assembly for its approval. It deals with the Federal Government projects in the FCT and is funded by an envelope of money given to the FCT administration by the Minister of Finance. The statutory budget is the FCT budget, which is prepared by the FCT administration to meet its obligations of paying salaries and other pressing needs of the FCT. It is funded from 1% of the Federal Government budget and the internally generated revenues of the FCT.
Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa. So, expectedly, when Abuja was declared Nigeria’s capital in the 70s, it witnessed the greatest influx of persons over the next two decades that made it the fastest growing city in the world. This influx of persons came with so much challenges especially as the persons struggled with the few resources and infrastructure available then. One of the important decisions reached by the Federal Government to ensure the decongestion of the city centre is the mass housing units which were predominantly private driven with the active collaboration of the Federal Government in the provision of the infrastructure needed in those areas. The Federal Government builds access roads to the places, provides water and other facilities to enable them habitable and the developers construct the buildings which they sell or hire to the owners or tenants. That was how great estates like Gwarimpa, Efab, Suncity, Lingo Estates arose. Gwarimpa estate is one of the largest estates in the world.
As expected, the fall in the revenue of the Federal Government as a result of our over dependence on oil affects every sector of the economy but with regards to the FCT it has become an emergency. Some weeks ago we heard about the kidnapping of some residents of the FCT, which made news around the world. More than four persons died in the Lokogoma area as a result of the unchecked erosion ravaging the areas. An Assistant Director was swept into the water collected by erosion in Galadimawa roundabout and he died. The bridges in such areas are rickety and unfit for constant use by the commuters and heavy-duty vehicles. There was this instance in the Pengasson area of Lokogoma, where two containers where used as bridges on the road in order to allow water to flow through them. Over time the containers started rusting and was a disaster about to happen. When erosion started claiming human beings, the FCTA removed them with no replacement at all. The road has become impassable till now.
Building access roads to such mass housing estates have been halted and water has become a luxury, which is unaffordable. The estate owners have resorted to self help with its attendant consequences. A case in hand is the Urban Shelter’s construction of the road that leads to Lokogoma junction from their estate. They promised to deliver in six weeks, but the project has lasted for almost one year cutting off Lingo Estate, Saraha four completely. The occupants of Lingo estate has to travel through the back of their estate for about 15 kms to come out to Lokogoma junction which is about 2kms from their estate. A journey that took them 2mins to travel now takes them an average of 1hour to navigate because of the traffic delays along Apo mechanic village. It is obvious that the fortunes of the FCT is degenerating at the peril of every Nigerian citizen.
A cursory look at the FCTA reveals that Muhammad M. Bello, the Hon. Minister of the FCT is a very conservative person who detests corruption. He looks like an incarnation of President Muhammadu Buhari both in physical looks and honesty. He has an accommodating demeanour for every religion and ethnic group. He is humble and respectful to everybody. I was wondering why the fortunes of FCT was deteriorating with such an administrator at the helm of affairs until I listened to the brief on FCT 2020 National Priority Budget presented by the Minister of FCT to the Senate Committee on FCT, Thursday, 17th October, 2019.
In this brief, in the year 2019, the FCT was appropriated the sum of N23,023,593,146.00 for its national budget. To date no fund has been released to the FCTA leading to 0% level of budget performance. The FCT slated about 31 important national priority projects to achieve in 2019 which included provision of primary infrastructure (road, water, sewage and power supply to mass housing districts. The design and construction of indoor substations in Lokogoma, Galadimawa, Kafe, Wumba, Karsana, Gaduwa, Dakibiyu, Lugbe, Duboyi and Okanje districts of the FCC. Karmo residential district infrastructure. All these projects were included in order to develop the satellite towns, provide habitable places for the citizens and relieve the burden of decongestion on the major elite areas of Abuja.
Unfortunately, for the 2020 fiscal year a total sum of N28,422,804,431 was given to the FCT as its National Capital Budget Envelope. In view of the poor performance of the FCT portion of the 2019 National Priority Budget, the FCT administration decided to reprioritize and rollover only essential on-going projects without making provision of any new project. In the same vein, the number of ongoing projects were reduced from 30 in 2019 to 13 in the proposed 2020 National Budget. A look at the proposal shows that all the projects targeted towards bettering the lives of the people living in all the mass housing estates were dropped in 2020. With the state of infrastructure in such estates, this calls for emergency.
I have not heard that a government in any part of the world gave zero allocation to its capital city for a whole year. This is a trend that should never happen again. The residents of these estates should make strong representations to the Federal Government to see the need to increase the budgetary allocation to the FCT to accommodate the infrastructural development of those estates. The Federal Government should immediately send a supplementary appropriation bill to the National Assembly for the execution of those long overdue projects. But above all, we must strive as a nation to increase our revenue base by diversifying our economy away from an over dependence on oil into other profitable ventures. The efforts should be concentrated in increasing the tax collection mechanism rather than increasing the tax payable by the people because of the prevailing unconducive economic climate.