Dan Atori – Minna
MINISTER of Finance Dr. Ngozi Okonjo Iweala on Tuesday told the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) that the Federal Government does not have the resources to meet its demands to the tune of N92 billion.
Okonjo-Iweala, in a speech at the opening of a two-day meeting of Commissioners of Finance and Accountants-General of States Ministries of Finance, said the N92 billion being demanded by the University Lecturers is not within the reach.
According to her, “at present ASUU wants the Federal Government to pay N92bn in extra allowances when the resources are not there and when we are working to integrate past increases in pensions. We need to make choices in this country as we are getting to the stage where recurrent expenditures take the bulk of our resources and people get paid but can do no work.
“Since I assumed office, the share of recurrent expenditure in our total budgets had increased astronomically. In fact recurrent expenditures accounted for about 77.2 % of the Federal Budget and we are now working to re-balance this ratio.
“The country is still suffering from the effect of the 2010 increase in salary. Do we want to get to a stage in this country that all the money we earn is used to pay salaries and allowances?”
Okonjo Iweala said at the meeting, with the theme ‘Restructuring Nigeria’s Finances’, that the N92bn being demanded by the University Lecturers is not within the reach of the Federal Government.
“If the demands of the University Lecturers are met and we continue to pay them salaries and allowances we will not be able to provide infrastructure in the universities,” she said.
The Minister also lamented that Nigeria’s over dependence on oil has resulted in deterioration of the nation’s non-oil taxes, noting that in 1970 non-oil taxes accounted for 74% of Nigeria’s Government revenues but by 2012 it had declined to only 30% of Federal Government revenues.
Accordingly, she said “many States and Local Governments are also dependent on monthly revenue allocation from the central government. On average only 11 percent of sub-national revenue was obtained from internally generated sources”.
Okonjo-Iweala disclosed that the volume of external and internal debts of the country has been on the increase saying that ‘in fact in August 2006 when I left office we had a total of $17.3bn comprised of $3.5bn in foreign debt and $13.8bn in domestic debt.
She added that “by 2011 when I returned to office the total debt now stood at 447.9bn and the domestic debt had now grown to about $42.3bn”.
The Minister, however, said the Federal Government has taken measures to revamp the economy, adding that these measures have started yielding dividends in the areas of direct capital investment in the country in establishment of industries and agro-based firms.
Governor Babangida Aliyu, in his address read by his Deputy, Honourable Ahmed Ibeto asked the Federal Government to plug all the areas of wastages in the oil sector of the economy and also check pipeline vandalization across the country.
Governor Aliyu suggested that Nigeria should pay more emphasis on the non-oil sector of the economy especially agriculture, now that many countries have discovered and are now refining oil.
