Amidst the growing challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdowns across the world, the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) disbursed N1.95 trillion to the Federal, States, Local government areas and other statutory agencies in the first quarter of 2020.
A breakdown of the disbursements shows that N791.4 billion went to the Federal Government, N669 billion was shared by the states and about N395 billion was shared by the 774 local government areas.
The balance went to the North East Development Commission, the Excess Crude Account, Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Nigeria Custom Service (NCS) and the Department of Petroleum Resources.
These pieces of information and data are contained in the latest edition of the Quarterly Review by Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) released in Abuja Monday.
The NEITI report also notes that the Q1 2020 FAAC disbursements are the highest first quarter disbursements since 2014. “Total disbursements were N1.648 trillion in Q1 2015, N1.132 trillion in Q1 2016, N1.411 trillion in Q1 2017, N1.938 trillion in Q1 2018, and N1.929 trillion in Q1 2019,” the publication stated.
The review examined FAAC disbursements in the first quarter of this year and made projections on the possible impacts of COVID-19 on government revenues. “While total disbursements in Q1 2020 were slightly higher than Q1 2019 and Q1 2018, disbursements to the three tiers of government in Q1 2020 were slightly lower than Q1 2019 and Q1 2018. This is due to transfers to other accounts in Q1 2020 which were not done in either Q1 2019 or Q1 2018. These include allocations to the North East Development Commission and transfer to Excess Crude Account,” the review stated.
The NEITI Quarterly Review explained that total FAAC allocations during the period under review comprised of gross disbursements to the Federal Government, States, Local Government Councils and the 13% Derivation. It also covered cost of collections by the Nigerian Customs Service, the Federal Inland Revenue Service, the Department of Petroleum Resources and other allied handling charges.