The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Kemi Adeosun

  • FAAC: Revenue declines by N33.1b in November

    FAAC: Revenue declines by N33.1b in November

    The revenue available for sharing by Nigeria’s Federal, States and Local Government in November declined by N33.1 billion.

    Thus, N386.9 billion was distributed to all tiers of government compared to the N420 billion shared in October.

    The Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, represented by the Accountant-General of the Federation,Mr Idris Ahmed on Thursday in Abuja attributed the decline to the decrease in crude oil export by 0.34 million barrels per day even though the average price of crude oil increased from 46.54 dollars to 47.08 dollars per barrel in November.

    “A brief Force Majeure was declared at Bonny Terminal while the Force Majeure at Forcados, Qua Iboje and Brass Terminals were still in place.

    “Federation revenue was low as a result of Shut-in and Shut-down of pipelines for repairs and maintenance due to leakages and sabotage. However, companies income tax and VAT recorded marginal increases.,” she said.

    Giving a breakdown of how the N386.9 billion revenue for the month was generated, Adeosun said N206.44 was from the distributable Statutory Revenue of the month.

    The sum of N6.33 billion was refunded by the NNPC to the Federation, N66 billion from the Excess Petroleum Profit Tax account, exchange gain of N38.85 billion and Value Added Tax, N75.6 billion.

    In summary, Adeosun said after deductions as cost of collection by FIRS, Customs and DPR, the Federal Government received N97.9 representing 52.68 per cent; states and N49.6 billion, representing 26.72 per cent.

    The local governments, she said, received N38.2 billion, amounting to 20.60 per cent of the amount distributed.
    She said N13.6 billion representing 13 per cent derivation revenue was also shared among the oil producing states.

    Adeosun said that the country generated N139.6 as mineral revenue and N100.5 billion as non-mineral revenue.

    She said this showed a decrease of N603 million and N2.07 billion from what the country generated as mineral and non-mineral revenue in the months of October and November.

    She said that the balance in the Excess Crude Account remains 2.45 billion dollars as at Dec. 15, 2016. (NAN)

  • N793mn recovered from three agencies, says Finance ministry

    N793mn recovered from three agencies, says Finance ministry

    An additional sum of N793 million has been recovered from three Federal Government Agencies by the Recovery Committee set up two weeks ago by the Minister of Finance Mrs.  Kemi Adeosun.

    The recoveries totaling N793 million were made from the Raw Materials Research and Development Council (RMRDC), N278 million; Nigeria Shippers Council, N407 million and Nigeria Export Promotion Council, N108 million.

    The Minister of Finance has declared that: “we expect greater compliance in the weeks ahead.”

    A statement from the ministry of finance on Wednesday  signed by Salisu Na’Inna Dambatta, the director Information of the ministry said the Committee was tasked to recover unremitted N450 billion operating surpluses (legally classified as a Federal Treasury Revenue) from Federal revenue-generating Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).

    The Committee, Dambatta said issued “demand notices to 17 of the initial 33 affected Agencies, out of which it met with 10, namely National Shippers Council, Nigeria Export Promotion Council, National Health Insurance Scheme, Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority and the Nigeria Communication Commission.  The rest were Nigeria Postal Service, National Pension Commission, Nigeria Bulk Electricity Trading Company, Raw Materials Research and Development Council and the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria.”

    So far, the cumulative total amount recovered, the ministry of finance said “is N1.44 billion given the earlier recovery of N650 million from the Nigeria Shippers Council even as several other Agencies were in the process of submitting repayment plan for approval.”

    The statement noted that, “four Agencies that were unable to make it to the meeting due to short notice have been rescheduled to appear before the Recovery Committee.  They are the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), National Pensions Commission (PENCOM), Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) and the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA).”

    It would be recalled that the Minister of Finance announced at a media conference on December 1 that  many revenue generating Federal Government Agencies have not remitted the operating surpluses from the revenues they generated totaling N450 billion from 2010 to date.  

    The Agencies are required to pay the operating surpluses to the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Federal Government not later than one month following the statutory deadline for publishing each corporation’s account as provided in Section 22 (2) of the Fiscal Responsibility Commission Act 2007.

  • FG launches N13bn mortgage refinancing scheme for civil servants

    FG launches N13bn mortgage refinancing scheme for civil servants

    The Federal Government has launched a N13 billion mortgage refinancing scheme for federal civil servants to be managed by the Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company Plc (NMRC).

    In the first phase, a total of 5,635 civil servants would benefit from the scheme which the government said would address the housing challenges facing the country, improve the living conditions and welfare of its work-force and people and generate gainful employment for the youth.

    The Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun while launching the scheme in Abuja on Friday said “the government had in recognition of the importance of housing earmarked N40 billion in the 2016 budget for the implementation of a comprehensive housing scheme line with the government’s overall objective of providing the necessary stimulus to kick-start growth in the current challenging economic environment.”

    Adeosun noted that the N13 billion mortgage refinance investment commitment by the  NMRC, would signal to investors at home and abroad that there are significant   opportunities in the Nigerian housing sector.

    According to the finance minister, “the Federal Civil Service workforce play an important role in nurturing and developing our nation so it is only fair that those who serve the country can be afforded the opportunity of owning their own home by retirement.”

    To check untoward activities, Kemi Adeosun stated that government has “put in place the right incentives as part of our anti-corruption drive to plug leakages.”

    The scheme is a collaboration initiated by the Office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation, the Federal Government Staff Housing Loans Board, the Federal Integrated Staff Housing Programme and the Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company Plc.

    Managing Director of NMRC, Prof Charles Inyangete assured the government that the agency would continue to provide liquidity to the housing market, noting that with the huge housing deficit in the country, “there is need for those involved in housing delivery to come up with affordable houses for the people.”

     

     

     

  • FEC okays transaction parties for $1 billion Eurobond

    FEC okays transaction parties for $1 billion Eurobond

    The Federal Executive Council (FEC) on Wednesday approved the appointment of transaction parties for one billion dollars Eurobond issue.

    The Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun briefed State House correspondents at the end of the FEC meeting chaired by President Muhammadu Buhari.

    She was in the company of Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed and Minister of Environment, Amina Mohammed.

    The transaction parties, she said, included Citigroup, Standard Charted bank, Standbic IBTC, Whiten case, Banwo and Igodalo and Africa Practices communications advisers.

    She said: “The one billion Eurobond program is part of the funding for 2016 budget and we hope to be able to commence the process in January. We obtained certificate of no objection from Bpp for the appointment of those parties having undertaken fully competitive open tender process.

    “We are confident that we will be able to complete the transaction expediently with significant interest. The oil price stability obviously is helping us, currently there is quite a bit of demand for emerging markets papers,” She said.

    According to her, Nigeria’s paper is currently trading around 7 to 8 percent mark.

    The minister added: “Angola came out in November with bench UAD I.56 and Gabon in June  did 8.25 plus Ghana in September did 9.25. We are expecting to get quite a competitive pricing on the issuance program which I said is to be used for the purpose of funding capital projects in the 2016 budget within the month of January.

    “The other thing to note is that these parties that have been appointed would run any Eurobond issuance program that we do for the next three years so that we don’t have to keep on re tendering unless there is a major problem with any of them they will be our parties for the next three years,” She stated.

    The Minister of Environment said that the Council considered finalizing the amendment of the gazette for the establishment of the hydrocarbon pollution restoration process/purchase.

    The gazette, she said, is the vehicle that is supposed to have all the government structures to will allow clean up in the Niger Delta starting with Ogoni land and the implementation  of the UNEP report.

    “Why is this so important, well what we have said in the past the past gazette did not put in place some of the government structures we need such as the government board, like the board of trustees or a structure that would be held accountable for the enormous amount of money that is already available to be spend and additional monies that we can leverage from the money that we have that is being offered by different partners.

    “This now will enable us to put more structure to the board of trustees who require a legal entity to put the resources in and then we hope that in the new year we will begin to roll out, to begin with the building of the centre of excellence, the integrated soil treatment centre will also go up and then we begin training, but in this case we start training many of the women on the livelihood side in the many of the contaminated areas.

    “Of recent, you would have heard that in Ogoni land itself we have pipelines …. I’ve visited there…those that are most affected there are the women farmers. So we have to find better ways of speaking with communities but also ensuring that livelihoods of women are not affected.

    “We are also speaking to many of the young people there, we have a good feedback from those who are interested in being a part of the rollout of the clean-up Ogoni land in the new year,” She said.

  • Finance Ministry uncovers 33,000 ghost workers

    Finance Ministry uncovers 33,000 ghost workers

    Finance Minister Kemi Adeosun has said the ministry has succeeded in reducing Federal Government’s monthly wage bill from N165bn to N142bn by eliminating 33,000 ghost workers.

    Adeosun, represented by the Head of the Efficiency Unit at the Ministry, Mrs. Patience Oniha, at the 2016 Fiscal Liquidity Assessment Committee Retreat, said the ministry had discovered that it could also save money by reviewing government’s procurement processes.

    She said that through the Efficiency Unit, the ministry had succeeded in negotiating huge discounts for government officials traveling on local and international flights for official assignments.

    Adeosun said that the ministry had also been able to save cost by banning sitting allowances, souvenirs at government’s functions and unnecessary adverts which had contributed to the high recurrent expenditure in government.

  • Development Bank of Nigeria gets $1.3b for SMEs financing

    Development Bank of Nigeria gets $1.3b for SMEs financing

    • Emefiele: ‘No disharmony with Minister’

    The Federal Government has set aside about $1.3 billion to support Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in the country. The fund will be managed by the Development Bank of Nigeria (DBN), the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, has said.

    Mrs. Adeosun, who spoke during a briefing with Nigerian reporters attending the International Monetary Fund (IMF)/World Bank Group meetings in Washington DC, yesterday, said SMEs are part of the engine that will spur the growth of the economy. She added that lending at low rates to SMEs will now be facilitated through the DBN.

    According to her, agreement has already been “reached on the final steps for the take-off of the Development Bank  which has been on hold due to some issues.

    “We have resolved all those issues, the recruitment process has now been finalised with the management team now being put in place,” she said, adding that the “DBN is for SMEs and many of them are traders that don’t qualify for bank loans, such as facilitated by the Bank of Industry (BoI).  The focus of DBN is SMEs and giving them low cost loans.”

    The media chat was witnessed by the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, her Permanent Secretary, Dr. Mahmud Isa Dutse, Deputy Governor, Economic Policy, Dr. Sarah Alade and Director-General, Debt Management Office (DMO), Dr. Abraham Nwankwo, amongst  other senior officials from the CBN.

    Also speaking, Emefiele said it was not true that there was disharmony between fiscal and monetary authorities on interest rates, saying “we feel that when people are able to access loans at low interest rates, it helps improve growth, reduce unemployment and boost industrial capacity.”

    He said based on the available data, the CBN’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) felt  it could pursue growth through another angle, pointing out that “it has nothing to do with disharmony.

    “I feel it is important for me to also join the minister to confirm that there is no disharmony. We are all working together and I believe that in due course, we would achieve the growth that we badly desire for the country,” he said

    Mrs. Adeosun said so far, the government has “been able to crowd in money to the tune of $1.3 billion from the World Bank, the African Development Bank (AfDB) and the European Investment Bank. We have made a lot of progress now and are ready to take off. We have advertised for the management positions and when appointed, they would be able to complement the work and build synergy with the CBN intervention. We need to get the money into the hands of smaller businesses that make up 50 per cent of our GDP.”

    On illicit financial flows, she said the Nigerian delegation to this year’s IMF/World Bank meeting “has some high level discussions with a number of countries where we have Nigerian money domiciled; when we talk about illicit financial flows, there is a number of issues involved- those from corrupt practices, tax evasion, tax avoidance and those who under pay tax. But we are working hard to bring them back to the country.”

    On Nigeria’s foreign loans, she said: “We are through with the AfDB and ready to go to the Eurobond. It is just to appoint the parties. It is particularly the issue of pricing, not the volume. We are going to look into how we can refinance some of our existing Naira debt into the international market to take advantage of the low international rates now. This would lessen the pressure on the domestic market. We have spoken with a lot of lenders and the market is really and very attractive now.”

     

  • Nigerian economy, not in confusion – Finance Minister

    Nigerian economy, not in confusion – Finance Minister

    The Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, on Wednesday declared that the Nigerian economy is not in confusion.

    Noting that the Nigeria economy has been heading to recession in the past six years, she however said that the economy is presently in the right hands.

    She spoke with State House correspondents at the end of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting presided by President Muhammadu Buhari.

    Adeosun was accompanied to the briefing by the Ministers of Agriculture, Audu Ogbeh; Mines and Steel Development, Kayode Fayemi; Information, Lai Mohammed and Education, Adamu Adamu.

    Responding to questions on the new economic statistics released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), she said: “It’s the worst possible time for us. Are we confused? Absolutely not. How are we going to get ourselves out of this recession. One, we must make sure that we diversify our economy. There are too many of us to keep on relying on oil.

    “We can see what happened at the output data of the oil and gas sector. What’s happening in the Niger delta has dragged down the GDP of the entire economy. We’re too dependent on oil whereas 87 percent of our GDP is oil. So let us drive those other areas

    “We have to invest in capital projects. No, we are not confused, the time is confusing but we are not confused. We are extremely focused. We know that if we can just bare and get through this difficult period, Nigeria is going to be better for it.

    “If we rely on oil and the price of oil remains low and the quantity of oil remains low, we can’t grow. We have to grow our non-oil economy. I think we that we have a long way to go.

    “We’re not confused and we’re not deceiving ourselves that everything is rosy. It’s not. It’s a difficult time for Nigeria but I think Nigeria is in the right hands and if we can stick with our strategy. We still have some adjustments to make. I think we need to make some adjustments in monetary policy. It’s quite clear we do and we will do that. We’re working on that. We need to try and find a way to support the manufacturing sector better and we will do that.” She added

    She pointed out that the high inflation rate in the country is cost-pushed.

    “And when you have cost-push inflation, it is structural inflation. It is not going to respond to monetary policy tools such as increasing the rate of interest. We have to address the structural causes of the inflation,” she said

    But, she however said that the high rate of inflation has slowed down, which is a good sign for the economy.
    ‎
    ‎According to her, the FEC on Wednesday approved external three-year rolling borrowing plan.

    The plan, she said, will be transmitted to the National Assembly for the approval.

    She said: “Recall when we came in we said our external borrowings strategy will be focused on confessional debts, low cost loans particularly from the multi-lateral agencies‎.”

    The conditions of the borrowing, she said, included concessional loans average interest rates‎ 1.25 per cent, four to seven year moratorium, and 20 years to pay.

    According to her, the loans will come from agencies like the World Bank, African Development Bank, China Exim Bank, and other development agencies like Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA)

    She added: “The sectors in particular that‎ these concessional loans will go to are the strategic sectors of the economy that will help to revive the economy. ‎There is Power. Significant amount of money are located to power projects particularly transmission. This is long term money that will enable us solve some of the problems in that sector.

    “There are projects around polio. There are some money that have been allocated to us to help us do some massive immunization, in order to control this recent outbreak. This is being provided by the World Bank.

    “There is provision for solid minerals and of course I’m very excited about the discovery of nickel. World Bank is supporting the project by the Ministry of Mines and Steel with $150 million to enable them strengthen their capacity in that area.

    “The largest beneficiary of our borrowing is agriculture because its equally strategic and we have programmes by the minister some of which he inherited and is going to restructure and reform and some are new to the ministry.

    “The balance will come from the Eurobond we had indicated.” She said.

    According to her, the FEC sent a strong signal on the need to reach out to the National Assembly to get the borrowing plan approved as soon as possible.

    “Because a lot of this money is for developmental projects. We need this money to be made available for us. Remember these are foreign exchange coming to our country that will help our economy.” She added

    Fayemi disclosed that the Council approved a new roadmap for mining to boost the growth and development of the industry.‎‎

    He said: “What the roadmap seeks to do is to grow the contribution of mining to the GDP on the back of the President’s vision to diversify the economy.  It is to build on the old roadmap of 2012.

    “What distinguishes this roadmap is its determination to build a regulatory agency – an independent regulatory agency in the mining sector. Stakeholders have been insisting that the ministry should not also be the regulator of the industry. ‎

    “We will now have Mining cadastral zonal offices which issue the licenses together with the mining inspecting directorate, mining environment compliance unit as well as the nautical mining units. These are directorate within the ministry but will form part of the independent regulatory agency.

    “The second point that is very critical is the ‎partnership with states. One of the challenges in mining is the tension between the federal government and the states. ‎The Federal Government owns the minerals in the sole but the states government owns the land. ‎

    He stressed that there won’t be any headway without a robust partnership between the two critical components of mining, adding that mining has not been thriving because of the tension between the Federal Government and states.‎‎

    “In this regard, minning cadastrail and zonal offices will also be created in the states to work on this.” He added

    He said that the roadmap is to also change the name of the Ministry from Ministry of Solid Minerals Development ‎to Ministry of Mines and Steel Development in line with glob‎al standard.

    The roadmap, he said, will also
    make it easier for foreign direct investment to come into the country by improving on Nigeria’s geo-sciences data.

    “Mining is about science and if you don’t search you won’t find. Council recognizes that and agreed that a lot of money be put into exploration.

    “The roadmap also focuses on financing the industry, the financial institutions don’t know much about mining and have not invested a lot in it‎.

    “One of the ways the President wants to re-energise the sector is to ensure it gives access to the Natural Resource Fund of the Federation Account which is really meant for agriculture, mining and water resources. But mining has never benefited from the fund. This is similar to ecological fund 1.8 per cent of federation.

    “Another focus is to ensure that value‎ addition is gradually being invested to and reduce the manner in which raw minerals are exported from Nigeria. It is to emphasize beneficiation and processing, so that what we produce is also improved upon before we embark on exportation.

    “We also want to ensure it is utilize here, we have granite, Marbel, bitumen yet we import the bulk of those products into Nigeria because processing does not take place here
    ‎
    Above all, it focuses ‎to increase the contribution of mining to the GDP of the country. Mining has gradually declined from 4.5 per cent of the GDP at independence to 0.33 per cent of the GDP as at today.

    “Given the new focus we can begin to scale that up again. Within the next decade, it’s readily expected that it will begin to climb up to about five per cent of the nation’s GDP.‎

    ‎”The roadmap gives a sense to how the country is paying attention to mining development which is more of an employment generator and wealth creator unlike oil, which recruits fewer people.

    “We want to upscale it and improve the skills of the people, making access to finance available and making technology available to them,” he stated
    ‎‎

  • FG justifies stoppage of export grant

    The Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun on Thursday justified the stoppage of the policy on Export Grant, which according to her, has been seriously abused.

    A statement from the ministry said that) the Minister, spoke during the visit of the leadership of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group, (NESG) to her office in Abuja. Responding to the explanation sought by members of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG) on the current status of Export Grant, the Minister stated that although her predecessor in office halted the implementation of the policy, she believed the decision was in order going by harvests of startling revelations on the abuse of export grant.

    She said: “On paper, why will you cancel Export Grant? The EG is set up to encourage export business. However, in a situation, where we do not have control, we open up doors for the kind of abuse, which are only imaginable.

    “We have people exporting stones, describing them as high valued goods, collecting an import credit and using that to import fish. We do need to look for how to support export, but we have to be very realistic in the recommendations we are coming up with.”

    The finance minister sought the understanding of members of the private sector in the ongoing tax policy review by the current administration.

    Adeosun challenged the private sector to come up with policies which are implementable in view of the current economic situation in the country.

    “Extending her hand of fellowship to the NESG, the Minister said the Ministry of Finance is ready to work with them and therefore challenged the private sector group to keep track of some of the recommendations to the Federal Government” the statement read.

    “I want to challenge you by asking you to keep track of how many of your polices are implemented and those not implemented. You also need to find out why those policies were not implemented. They may be great policies at wrong times, or they may be wrong  policies. They may even be un-implementable policies.

    “I’m giving you the commitment of the Federal Ministry of Finance to assist you. You are invited to the Federal Ministry of Finance and spend a day and sit with our people and see how government affairs are being run.”

    The Minister also stressed the need to prioritise in the face of the revenue challenge in the country. She stated that “the economy is challenged and people are extremely frustrated and we need to rebuild fundamentally, we need to prioritise. We have to rebuild this country and it has to be data driven.

    “We are already overhauling our tax policy. We want to have a realistic picture of tax. We need to realize that with the collapse of commodity prices we don’t have enough foreign exchange to buy as many imported goods as we like to, so when there is import substitution, we must embrace it.”

  • Nigerian economy: Recession trends on Google

    Nigerian economy: Recession trends on Google

    The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele and Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun appeared to take different positions on the state of Nigeria’s economy. Are we in a recession yet or not? is the question Nigerians have been asking and they have taken their search for answers to Google.

     

    …Anambra State leads search in Nigeria

     Perhaps there’s been some  uncertainty about whether Nigeria’s economy  is fully in a recession or just “technically” in recession, thanks to recent comments on the issue by the CBN chief and Mrs Adeosun.

    Local interest in the term peaked in the past three months, with questions about the recession in Nigeria  trending on Google in July.

    For those who may still be  still in the dark about the state of the economy , it may be a good idea to pluck a leaf from the tree of knowledge growing in Anambra State. Anambra currently tops the list of states in Nigeria searching for “recession” and other related terms.

    Perhaps the curiosity of the  gentlemen traders at Iweka road, Onitsha, who just needed to know why all  this fuss about a recession, sent the state to the head of the Search list, trumping cosmopolitan Abuja and Lagos, as seen below.

    1. Anambra State.
    2. Federal Capital Territory.
    3. Rivers State.
    4. Lagos State.

    So why are residents of other States not searching for terms related to the recession? Unfortunately, Google has no answers to that question, but globally, Nigeria is one of the top three countries with the most searches for the term. In other words, we are not alone on this one -even good old stable Canada is worried.

    1. United Arab Emirates
    2. Singapore
    3. Nigeria
    4. Canada
    5. Ireland
    6. South Africa
    7. U.S.A

    Below is a list of questions people are asking in Nigeria about the recession. You may want to Google numbers 6 and 9 while you are at it.

    1. Economic recession in Nigeria?
    2. what is recession / recession definition
    3. what is economic recession
    4. difference between recession and depression
    5. recession proof businesses
    6. how to survive in economic recession
    7. how to add value during a recession
    8. when is an economy in recession
    9. how to make money in a recession
    10. causes of recession

    According to analysts, Nigeria’s recession was triggered by a dip in government revenues and spending in the wake of the  fall in global crude oil prices. It’s likely to be a bumpy ride ahead for the country, so it’s important to live by the first rule for surviving a recession- Start saving money now.

  • FG reviews profile of revenue agencies

    The Federal Government on Thursday said it has commenced cost profile review of all its revenue generating agencies.

    The Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, said this at a two-day National Revenue Retreat in Kano, the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports.

    The retreat was organised by the Ministry of Finance as part of government’s effort to shift emphasis from oil to non-oil revenue.

    Adeosun said the measure was necessary in order to ensure that maximum operating surpluses were declared and remitted in compliance with the Fiscal Responsibility Act.

    She said the ministry had commenced audits of agencies that would provide the government improved visibility into the revenue and cost profiles.

    “This will enable us to generate an indicative cost profile that can be used to establish reasonable budget targets going forward,” she said.

    The minister stressed that the focus was now on non-oil revenue generation, adding that exploiting solid minerals and agricultural sectors of the economy was necessary step in the right direction.