States and local governments yesterday
aborted the May 2013 Federation Account
Allocation Committee (FAAC) meeting. They
walked out on Minister of State for Finance Dr
Yerima Lawal Ngama and left Abuja without
any cash.
The meeting is the forum where monthly
allocation to the tiers of government is
shared.
Commissioners of Finance Forum Chair
Timothy Odaah (Ebonyi State) said there
would no longer be FAAC meetings “until all
the conditions are met by the Federal
Government”.
He said commissioners were going back
empty handed.
By implication, states that depend entirely
on the monthly allocation from the FAAC
meeting may not be able to meet basic
obligations, like paying workers’ salaries and
contractors.
Odaah gave the reasons for quitting the
meeting to include: “The non-
implementation of the decisions and
resolutions taken in most FAAC meeting
plenary sessions, especially the May 2013
resolutions which still remains inconclusive
based on the fact that the arrears of February
have not been paid.”
He also complained about the failure of the
committee to pay “augmentation of last
month (April Allocation) passed with a
resolution.”
He said this augmentation has not been paid
“and there is no clue as to why”.
Odaah lamented that “every month, returns
from the states accountant generals appear
to be shabbier than the previous one”.
He said states “have taken a lot of
disappointment from the administration of
FAAC which by intents and purposes has
become templates of ineptitude”.
The states and local governments, he added,
“have been bearing with the situation”.
“Workers and contractors have to be paid,
the various programmes of the state
governments and local governments that are
embodied in their various manifestos to carry
the federation of Nigeria along with other
obligations have to be met”.
The commissioners of Finance said they had
decided to take the matter up with the
President “ so that he and the state
governments have to meet on these
decisions that we have been hiding for them
to put heads together with every other well
meaning persons in the federation so that
this problem will be resolved once and for
all”.
Odaah noted that no member of the forum
was absent from the media briefing, an
indication that “this is a unanimous decision
and resolution by all of the commissioners of
finance”.
There were indications that trouble was
brewing after the technical session when
commissioners, while waiting for the arrival
of the minister of state for Finance, told
Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF)
Jonah Otunla, that they would not accept any
delay of the plenary session, the meeting
that endorses the decisions of the state
Accountants-General at the technical session
which also ratifies the amount to be shared
for the month.
Shortly thereafter, Ngama came in for the
plenary and about 50 minutes later, the
commissioners of finance started trooping
out of the auditorium of the Ministry of
Finance venue of the planned FAAC meeting
and headed for Sheraton Hotel to address
the media.
The Nation reported on Wednesday that the
Federal Government was constrained to pay
the arrears because it had initially released
$1 billion to the states on request.
The Federal Government argued that since
the $1 billion was drawn from the Excess
Crude Account (ECA) and financing the
February arrears will also be drawn from the
same ECA, paying the February arrears
would drastically dwindle the reserves in the
ECA.
However, the Federal Government has
agreed to offset the February arrears in
installments through augmentation to allow
the ECA recover from the $1 billion
withdrawn from the account.
The February arrears is almost $1 billion, the
amount advanced to the states from the ECA
as a privilege extended to the states.