The Federal Government has said it will propose a sum of N9.79
trillion to the national assembly as total expenditure in the 2020
budget.
The amount which represents an increase of 9.75 percent over N8.916
trillion spending for 2019, is based on the projection of a proposed
revenue of about N7.64 trillion and a total proposed fiscal deficit
component of about N2.142 trillion.
Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed,
disclosed this in Abuja at a public consultation forum with civil
society groups and agencies on the draft 2020-2022 medium term
expenditure framework (MTEF), on Tuesday.
She said the budget will be proposed based on the assumption of an oil
production capacity of 2.18 million barrels per day, crude oil price
of $55 per barrel, against $60 per barrel last year, and exchanged
rate of N305 to the dollar.
The minister of finance said debt service is projected to increase
from N2.14 trillion in 2019 to about N2.45 trillion; statutory
transfer of N526.46 billion, from N502.1 billion in 2019, and sinking
fund of N296 billion, from N110 billion.
She also said recurrent non-debt appropriation was put at about N4.57
trillion against N4.39 trillion in the 2019 budget.
She added that inflation rate for the year is projected at an average
of 10.81 percent, with nominal consumption figure of about N122.75
trillion and nominal gross domestic product of N142.96 trillion. The
GDP growth rate is put at about 2.93 per cent.
Ahmed said a breakdown of the non-debt proposal includes ministries,
departments and agencies (MDAs) personnel cost of N2.675 trillion;
government-owned enterprises (GOEs) personnel costs (N218.8 billion);
overheads for MDAs (N280.3 billion); overheads of GOEs (N146.14
billion).
She provided details of the capital expenditure to include capital
supplementation (N234.2 billion); statutory transfers for capital
expenditure (N289.1 billion); capital allocation for special
intervention programme (N150 billion); MDAs capital expenditure
(N827.3 billion).
On the issue of deficit financing for the 2020 budget, Ahmed said the
government plans to mobilise additional financing from the sale of
government property, proceeds from privatisation, sale of non-oil
assets, multi-lateral and bilateral project-tied loans and new foreign
and domestic borrowings.
She said the draft MTEF showed the country was facing significant
medium-term fiscal challenges, including revenue generation and rapid
growth in personnel costs.
The minister said the federal government will implement key reforms
under the strategic revenue growth initiative to boost revenue
collection and expenditure management.
She said the government has taken steps to block leakages in the
system, through an October deadline given by President Muhammadu
Buhari for all MDAs to implement the Integrated Personnel Payroll
System (IPPIS).
Ahmed added that workers in MDAs that fail to move to the IPPIS
platform may not be paid their salaries from October.
