Tag: FAAC

With increased revenue from the FAAC, state governments should complement the efforts of the Federal Government by paying more attention to the needs of their people

Ask your governor. That would seem the simple message that the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Nentawe Goshwe Yilwatda, passed across to many Nigerians who, rather than look toward their state administrations, always look to the centre for virtually everything that is wrong with the country. However, unlike many people who merely say the governors are receiving more money under the Tinubu administration than hitherto, Yilwatda gave specific figures of the quantum leap in the allocations to the states from the Federation Account.

“Governors now receive two to four times more than before. They can focus on bigger projects, but they must also improve the daily lives of the people,” he said even as he urged Nigerians to engage local leaders more than they are doing presently.

The APC chair spoke at a book launch, Vicious Red Circle written by Alex Ugochukwu Oriaku, in Abuja, on Monday. According to him, state governors are getting more than enough and should not have any reason to complain. “We have 24 (that is APC governors) and we are still counting. We will have more. We know that two years ago, what they used to share was about N400 billion per month. But today, the last they shared was N2.2 trillion. No governor in Nigeria today collects less than three times, four times of what they used to collect before. None.

“They can do more for their people. They are focusing now on bigger projects. And to me, this is a turnaround that we need in governors. I would say, talk to your governors. Talk to your local government chairmen. Let them do more. Talk to the APC governors to do more’’.

It could not have been more bluntly said.

No governor has controverted the claim that they now have more cash in their kitty. That was one of the reasons we are not hearing any of them complaining that they cannot pay the new minimum wage of N70,000 per month. As a matter of fact, it is as if some state governors are celebrating money festival (Yoruba people will say ‘won n se odun owo’), as some of them are, even on their own, announcing bigger packages than the official minimum wage. Lagos and Rivers are paying N85,000 each, Bayelsa, Enugu, and Oyo N80,000 each, and Ogun at N77,000. Other states like Delta, Ebonyi, and Kebbi also have minimum wages between N75,000 and N77,000 while Kogi is paying N72,500.

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This was not the situation before the advent of the Tinubu administration. As a matter of fact, at least 14 state governments were, according to the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), either unable or struggled to pay the former N30,000 minimum wage that was enacted in 2019. The states were: Abia, Adamawa, Anambra, Bayelsa, Benue, Borno, Cross River and Delta. Others were Enugu, Gombe, Imo, Nasarawa, Niger, Sokoto, Taraba and Zamfara states.

Lest we forget, many state governments relied on bailouts from the Federal Government in the Buhari years before they could get out of their financial quagmire.

But all that has changed. Thanks to the Tinubu administration that removed fuel subsidy and also ‘’floated’’ the naira. The two policies have led to availability of more money in the coffers of the Federal Government that the three tiers of government are now sharing. As the APC chair observed, allocations from the Federal Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) have often exceeded the N2 trillion per month mark post-May 2023, with record highs over N2.2 trillion. State governments’ collective share has increased substantially, from about N400bn to N700bn+ monthly.  Like many other state governments, Abia State government has thus doubled from about N12 billion to N13 billion monthly. Many state governments are said to be paying up their debts as a result of the improved funding.

This is good news.

But, the bad news is that many governors are just not getting their priorities right, as Yilwatda observed.  Indeed, some of them are behaving akin to a Yoruba proverb that says the initial money that a child makes he spends to buy bean cake (owo ti omode ba koko ri, akara lo maa fi ra). They simply forgot where they were coming from. May be we can pardon those of them who are first-time governors and have not experienced the rough times. But what of those among them that were returned to office? Should they not have learnt sufficient lesson on how to be prudent with funds?

Under the 1999 constitution, as amended, all tiers of government have their functions. Critical services like primary health and education fall under local governments, while secondary health, education and infrastructure fall under state governments. The Federal Government has responsibilities for national security, tertiary healthcare, the economy, etc.

Unfortunately, while the constitution is clear on these roles, many state governments have hijacked the local governments and indeed pocketed them. President Bola Tinubu tried to extricate the local councils from the apron strings of the state governments, to no avail. Not even a Supreme Court judgment could free them from the clutches of the governors, who in many cases do not want to see autonomous local governments in the first place. And the reason is simple; the governors are not satisfied with their own portion of the national cake. They want more and that more they want to rake in from the local governments.

The result is that the local governments merely exist in name in many states. Their chairmen cannot do anything without the consent of the governors. All the councils get as allocations are mainly to pay salaries. The results are glaring in several parts of the country: bad local roads, inadequate or no drainage, dilapidated primary schools, wastes all over the place, etc.

You may not like the Tinubu government for different reasons, chief of which is that cost of living is high under it. But you cannot deny the fact that it has done some things to alleviate the sufferings of Nigerians. Imagine the number of people that have benefitted from the Nigerian Education Loan Fund, (NELFUND) that the administration set up to cater to the needs of indigent students whose parents cannot afford to send their children to higher institutions. The idea is to ensure that no one is denied access to higher education simply on account of parental poverty. I learnt that as of late October, over 624,000 students have benefited from the fund, and over N116.4 billion disbursed since the portal opened in May, 2024.

I always cite the example of one of my seniors in the university who paid glowing tributes to his parents for “gladly embracing poverty to see him through university education”. The loan takes care of the students tuition fees as well as N20,000 monthly stipend would lessen the burden on such parents because it is not easy to gladly embrace poverty. As they say, “iya ki ise omi obe” (suffering is not pepper soup). The NELFUND would definitely make a lot of difference to many parents.

Talk also of the conditional cash transfer in which the Federal Government has launched a conditional cash transfer programme targeting 15 million vulnerable households in Nigeria, to provide N75,000 to each eligible household over a three-month period. Talk also of the loan scheme for income earners to purchase their needs now and pay in installments. 

Even before now, the bad faith on the part of some state governments manifested with the palliatives that were distributed during the Buhari era, which some public officials at the state level converted to political pork.

If we can have some of these initiatives complemented by the state governments, “ebi npa mi” (I am hungry) slogan would not be as popular as it is today. Forget the fact that the person who made us adopt it as a slogan is not one of those really hungry! And if he is; his is a different kind of hunger!

Then, talk of grandiose projects that have no bearing to the real needs of the people that some state governments are embarking upon. Take airports, for instance; which, apart from public officials in some states, are of no use to most other people. Yet, we find some governors sinking billions of tax payers’ money into them even when many roads in their states are death traps.

All said, the APC chair could have appropriately diagnosed the problem; to wit; that many state governments are not getting their priorities right, but, I seem to disagree with him on his rhetorical statement asking us (or, who in particular?) to tell him if we want him to tell the governors to do the right thing. Hear him: “If you feel I need to talk to the governors, please tell me. I will call their attention. And if you feel you want to have a nexus within the National Assembly and the government, not just at the national level, even the state governments, you want to have that nexus between them, we have most of the governors.’’

Yilwatda does not need any prompting from any quarters before doing the needful. If he is convinced his assertions are right, then he should just go ahead and tell the governors what they seem not to be doing right. After all, as he noted, his party has a preponderance of the governors; 24 out of 36 and ‘’still counting’’.  That is getting close to shellacking!

“We have 24 and we are still counting. We will have more.’’

So, Nigerians, you now have a better idea of what to do when certain things are not working. All eyes do not have to be on Abuja all the time. Your local government chairmen and governors are closer to you. They should be the first set of people to reach in times of trouble. Meet them. Ask them. After all, as they say, all politics is local.