FAAC reconvenes, shares N647.39b February revenue

Following the intervention by the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, the stalemated Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) meeting yesterday reconvened and agreed to share N647.39 billion to federal, states and local governments as revenue generated in the month of February.

Adeosun said after deductions for cost of collections had been made to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Nigeria Customs and the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), the Federal Government received N257.92 billion.

And in accordance with the revenue sharing formula, the 36 states received N130.82 billion, while the local councils got N100.86 billion.

However, this did not come without the resolution that FAAC is to undertake a joint reconciliation audit with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) of its revenue earnings and cost incurred during the period under review.

The intervention by the finance minister in the face-off is to ensure that workers receive their salaries for this month before the Easter break, as the stalemate was likely to throw thousands of public sector workers into a hard time throughout the festive period that begins tomorrow.

With the approval and distribution, the Accountant-General of the Federation yesterday signed the mandates for the Central Bank of Nigeria to pay the approved revenue allocation into the accounts of the federal, states and local councils.

She gave insight into her intervention: “The figure for this month is higher than last month. There are issues that we would take up with NNPC but those issues notwithstanding, we should go ahead and conclude the meeting.

We would sit down with Group Managing Director (GMD) of NNPC or its representatives, within the next 48 hours to thrash out subsisting issues.”

In his response, the Chairman of Commissioners of Finance Forum, Malam Mahmoud Yunusa, said the NNPC deliberately sidelined other stakeholders in a business that belongs to all.

“We have agreed last night to hold the meeting as it were, move on to our respective states and pay the salary so that every body will celebrate the Easter.

Be that as it may, the account as submitted by NNPC is still not acceptable to us. We will sit down with NNPC to ensure all the grey areas are trashed out. What we expected from NNPC is less than what was submitted.”

The states and local councils had last month got N126.482 billion and N97.512 billion respectively.

The 13 per cent derivation accounted for the balance of the statutory revenue of N57.356 billion.

The 36 states received Value Added Tax of N42.935 billion compared with N46.39 billion received in the previous month, while the Federal and Local Governments received VAT of N12.88 billion and N30.054 billion, respectively.

Both federal and local councils had received N13.917 billion and N32.473 billion, respectively, from VAT in February 2018.