The Federal Government says it has
released N400 billion from the 2016 budget to implement capital projects
and an additional N60 billion will be released in a few days time.
Addressing journalists on the state of
the economy yesterday, Minister of Finance, Mrs Kemi Adeosun, revealed that “over N400 billion has been released so far from the allocated
funds for capital expenditure. According to her, "we are holding another meeting today for
N60 billion to be released in a couple of days". Also, we have been pumping
money into the economy since May when the budget was signed.”
Speaking on the recession that the
country has slid into, the finance minister assured that the country
will come out of it. However, to overcome recession, she insisted
that “if we stick to what we are doing: fight corruption, redirect
stolen funds to the economy, cut out wastage, duplication and leakages,
continue with the payroll clean up of the N165 billion Federal
Government wage bill every month, the economy will recover. She added that, “you will soon begin to see the sign posts of recovery”.
However, the finance minister lamented that debt
overhang has slowed things down even though the Federal Government has
generated about N200 billion so far in revenue. “In order to reflate the
economy, as money comes in, we shoot it out.”
She also disclosed that the Ministry of
Finance has been mandated to manage looted exhibits recovered from past
public office holders.
Some of the looted exhibits she said
include “items of jewellery in value to buy a house.” The finance
minister added that the Federal Government has started renegotiating
Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects in order to bring in private
money to help develop the much needed infrastructure which will help
create jobs.
She lamented that there was “a lot
of abuse on duty waivers and the interministerial committee is just
finalizing its work on that area.”
The finance minister also spoke on why
the Federal Government cannot unilaterally spend funds in the Treasury
Single Account (TSA). According to her, overall TSA balance is in credit
“but government cannot spend that money because not all the monies
belong to the government, withdrawing from it can cause financial
crisis.” THE NATION
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