by Usman Alabi
The Niger State governor, Abubakar Bello on Friday presented a budget of N108.07 billion for the 2017 fiscal year to the state House of Assembly.
The News agency of Nigeria reports that the budget, which is 21.27 per cent higher than the 2016 budget of N85.09 billion, was tagged “Budget of consolidation”.
The recurrent expenditure is pegged at N48.04 billion, representing 44.45 per cent, while N60.02 billion was set aside for capital expenditure, which represents 55.55 per cent of the entire budget.
Out of the capital expenditure, administration sector will have N6.64 billion; economic sector gets N34.44 billion, law and justice N1.08 billion; and social sector N17.84 billion.
The governor stated that the 2016 budget recorded 67 per cent budget performance from January to October 2016, largely due to the inability to meet its internal revenue targets.
“In Niger state, our problem was compounded by our inability to meet our internal revenue targets with only an average of N400 million monthly.
“This calls for radical transformation of the revenue institutions and infrastructure and in general, conscious efforts will be made to diversify the economy,” he said.
He further stated that despite the economic challenges and the paucity of finance to fund the 2016 budget, a lot of projects were still carried out.
The governor said the focus of the 2017 budget would be on youths and women as they constituted the major percentage of the population of the state.