In his “State of the State” address to the House of Assembly yesterday, Fayemi urged the lawmakers to join the struggle against “repressive federal power.”
He said: “Because every state in Nigeria depends largely on the allocation from the federation account and the annual budgets of states are predicated upon earnings from the federation account, any major change, due to poor handling/depletion of the nations’ resources, will expectedly have ripple effects on the implementation of budgets at the state and local government levels.”
Fayemi said Nigeria earned more revenue from oil sale in 2013 and 2014 than budgeted, given the fact that “the average oil benchmark prices in the national budget are $79 per barrel for 2013 and $77.5 per barrel for 2014″, adding: “At no time did Nigerian oil sell less than $95 in 2013 and $110 in 2014.”
He urged the Assembly to critically assess the revenue going into the federation account and direct that they should be reported in the consolidated revenue fund.
The governor called for the abolition of the excess crude account, saying it allows the Federal Government to “manipulate” the proceeds into the federation account.
He urged the Assembly to join in the struggle to ensure the separation of the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation and the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federal Government; creation of the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation, which shall be separate from the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federal Government; audit of Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) account; payment of outstanding revenue due to the federation account by NNPC; and review of the revenue allocation formula, which was last done 15 years ago.
Fayemi said N4.929 trillion had not been remitted into the federation account in the last three years, noting that the country’s oil proceeds had consistently shrunk due to the alleged schemes of the Federal Government through the consolidated revenue earnings.
On the Sovereign Wealth Fund for the excess crude account, Fayemi said the deductions by the Federal Government were “insensitive and criminal”, adding: “Ekiti was shortchanged of N481 million in terms of monthly allocations from the federation account between September, 2013 and February, 2014.
“What we are doing today is necessary to ensure that our people are not left in the dark because Nigeria’s economy depends largely on oil.”
The governor urged members of the Assembly to alert people of the state’s unstable earnings and the “mismanagement of funds by the Federal Government”.
He urged the Supreme Court to hear cases of illegal deductions before it to halt the impending financial crisis facing some states due to the paucity of funds.
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