Even as Nigerians decry the current Government’s penchant for piling up loans and
debt ostensibly for infrastructure development, attention has shifted to the build up of
humongous, extra-budgetary expenditures, considered unconstitutional by global
analysts and political stakeholders.
The IMF’s latest Article IV Consultation highlights and accuses President Tinubu’s
Administration of running expenditures equivalent to about 2 percent of Nigeria’s Gross
Domestic Product, GDP, outside recent official budget documents, completely Hidden
From The Nigerian Public.
Using Nigeria’s estimated GDP, Atiku Abubakar of the African Democratic Congress
(APC) who put the value of the expenditure at a staggering ₦8.8 trillion, is alarmed
that the funds were spent “outside the statutory framework of Nigeria’s official budget
documents, unaccounted for, unaudited and hidden from the Nigerian people”.
The Tinubu-led All Progressives Congress has continued to pour huge sums into such
controversial no-bid contracts as the Lagos-Calabar Coastal Highway and other big
ticket projects to the consternation of economy watchers.
Millions of patriots are incensed at President Tinubu’s cavalier attitude to extant laws
governing spendings without appropriation. Atiku decries the Tinubu administration’s
ease with awarding multi-trillion naira contracts, moving massive public capital, and
commissioning infrastructure projects entirely beyond the reach of the Auditor-General,
the nation’s Procurement Laws, and the legitimate oversight of the National Assembly."
Observers of the polity note how such behaviour may be encouraging blatant
corruption as massive as the ongoing scandal over the damning, fraudulent creation of
a Government Agency involving the current office of the President’s Chief of Staff.
As Nigeria’s total debt to GDP ratio of about 33% approaches unsustainable levels (IMF
threshold of 40%) experts and critics wonder how long the economy can continue to
allow such opacity and unconstitutionality. Nigeria’s challenges with revenue
mobilization, accountability and economy-damaging insecurity are well known to the
international community and profligacy by the fiscal authorities can only worsen the
struggling political-economy.
There’s no better time than now, in the run up to next year’s general elections , where
politicians get desperate for campaign funds, for citizens rights activists to pressure
the National Assembly to demand from executive, a full disclosure of all Federal
expenditure outside the country’s appropriation bills. That is the only way to infuse
some amount of caution and transparency a regime beset with a known crisis of
accountability .
a comprehensive audit by the Auditor-General of the Federation and full public
disclosure of every expenditure referenced by the IMF.