Wednesday, February 8, 2012

Group Wants Breakdown of Statutory Transfers


This Day
29 January 2012


A leading civil society organisation, Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), has demanded for a breakdown of the lump sums of money earmarked in the 2012 Budget as Statutory Transfers.

They include the N150 billion for the National Assembly and N85 billion for the National Judicial Council (NJC),Niger-Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Universal Basic Education (UBE), and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) which have allocations of N54 billion, N68 billion, and N40 billion respectively.

CSJ said the details were necessary "for the public to be in a position to determine the propriety or otherwise of some hefty provisions in the budget at a time when we are all called to make sacrifices."

CSJ, in the letter dated January 18, 2012 addressed to the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and signed by its Lead Director, Eze Onyekpere, said it was making the request in line with the Freedom of Information (FoI)Act and the Fiscal Responsibility Act

"We have gone through the details of the 2012 Appropriation Bill and the estimates as detailed in the website of the Budget Office of the Federation and the printed version and discovered that statutory transfers are stated as lump sums without any details or disaggregation. Unlike the estimates of other Ministries, Departments and Agencies of Government (MDAs) including the Presidency and the Ministry of Finance, there are no details showing the components of the lump sums and how the Ministry of Finance arrived at these sums stated as statutory transfers.

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