Uche Usim, Abuja
The three tiers of government shared N626.82 billion being the Federal Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) disbursement for April. The figure includes Value Added Tax (VAT) and foreign exchange equalisation.
The Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), Ahmed Idris, at a press briefing in Abuja yesterday at the end of a reconvened FAAC meeting said the figure was N20 billion lower than N647.39 billion shared in March.
Out of the figure, the Federal Government got N263.102 billion, while states got N167.511 billion and Local Government Areas (LGAs) shared N126.293 billion. The 13 per cent mineral revenue for oil producing states stood at N54.518 billion, while the cost of collection and Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) stood at N15.402 billion.
In further breakdown, the gross statutory revenue of N480.599 received was lower than N557.943 billion received in the previous month by N77.344 billion.
Crude oil export sales volume decreased by 13 per cent when compared with 5.42 million barrels recorded the previous month and thus reduced earnings by $33.58 million.
The Excess Crude Account (ECA) has also crashed from $2.3 billion to $1.830 billion after $496 million was deducted for the purchase of Tucano military airplanes from the US.
On the postponement of FAAC meeting on Wednesday, he said members rejected the revenue figures declared by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), adding that there was ongoing reconciliation of NNPC revenue figures for February.
“The reconciliation is ongoing. There is no public finance system that will be devoid of reconciliation at any time. So, reconciliation is part of the order and in that particular instance, reconciliation that has started last month continued this month and there is nothing new.
“We couldn’t meet yesterday because we felt certain milestones have to be reached and on getting to those millstones, we sat today and have considered the figures for distribution,” he said.