The Federal Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) has said it shared a total of N605.958 billion as May 2021 revenue to the Federal, States and Local Governments as well as other relevant agencies just as Bayelsa State government has said that deductions amounting to N11.678 billion by the Federal Government from its monthly revenue allocation over disputed oil wells with sister states were illegal. The Technical Adviser to the Governor on Finance, Revenue and Accounts, Mr Timipre Seipulou, stated this on Thursday in Yenagoa while responding to questions after the state’s transparency briefing for the months of March and April 2021. He said though a lower court had ruled over the matter, the Federal Government should have allowed all the legal processes to be exhausted before making such deductions.
Seipulou, who noted that the state government had protested over the issue to no avail, said N939.865 million was being deducted monthly from the Bayelsa government’s allocation, which payment is spread over a period of one year. His words: “The N11 billion deducted is the fund we were earning from statutory and derivation allocations. But now we have legal issues with our sister states where some oil wells are being contested. “While the issue is still in court, the Federal Government said that the Bayelsa State government needed to pay the money back to the federation account. The Federal Government should not have deducted such funds until the legal processes were exhausted. The Bayelsa government had made its objection very clear but because the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) allocations are distributed from Abuja through the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), they took the decision to deduct our money. It is a decision we are not comfortable with.”
Seipulou also made some clarification over the payment of staff and teachers in Ogbia local government council, stressing that the state government for the past three months has been collaborating with the council to pay workers’ salary, including ensuring that promotions were effected up to date. Presenting the income and expenditure report for the month of March, Seipulou said the total gross inflow was N10.4 billion, consisting statutory allocation of N2.118 billion, derivation N5.922 billion and Value Added Tax N1.5 billion. Other receipts were foreign exchange equalisation N221.4 million and ecological fund N57.77 million among other items. The governor’s aide also announced N1.998 billion as total deduction from FAAC made up of foreign loans to federal government recovery N35.91 million, refund on N11 billion from Bayelsa allocation N939.865 million among other components, leaving the state with a net inflow of N8.5 billion. He said the internally generated revenue from February was N1.19 billion in addition to other receipts of N20 billion totalling N21.19 billion. According to him, the total receipts of N21.19 billion in addition to the net FAAC inflow of N8 billion came up to N29.25 billion in March.
Mr Charles Nwodo, Director, Information, Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, in a statement in Abuja, said the amount was shared during a virtual conference of the committee. The committee, in a communique, noted that the N605.958 billion shared included cost of collection to the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) and the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS). The committee also stated that the Federal Government received N242.120 billion, the states got N194.195 billion while the LGs received N143.742 billion. It added that the oil producing states received N26.901 billion as derivation (13 per cent of mineral revenue). According to the committee, the Gross Revenue available from the Value Added Tax (VAT) for May 2021 was N181.078 billion as against N176.710 billion distributed in the preceding month of April 2021. This resulted in an increase of N4.368 billion. It said “The distribution is as follows; Federal Government got N25.260 billion, the States received N84.202 billion, and Local Government Councils got N58.941 billion.
“The distributed Statutory Revenue of N428.198 billion received for the month was lower than the N497.385 billion received for the previous month by N69.197 billion, from which the Federal Government received N175.541 billion, States got N89.037 billion, LGs got N69.644 billion, and Derivation (13 per cent Mineral Revenue) got N24.666 billion.” The committee also revealed that Companies Income Tax (CIT), and Oil and Gas Royalties, Import and Excise Duty recorded decreases, while only VAT increased, although, marginally. It said the total revenue distributable for the current month was inclusive of Gross Statutory Revenue of N357.888 billion, VAT of N168.403 billion, Solid Mineral Revenue of N7.940 billion, Exchange Gain of N1.727 billion and an augmentation from Non-Oil of N50 billion and N20 billion. The committee said this brought the total distributable revenue to N605.958 billion.
