NLC to partner Audtior General on budget accountability, transparency

The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) says it will partner with the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation (AGF) to ensure accountability and transparency in the national budgetary system.

Mr Ayuba Wabba, NLC President said this during a one day maiden Roundtable Discussion of 2020 Budget organised by NLC on Wednesday in Abuja.

Wabba said that the partnership was necessary due to controversial issues surrounding the implementation of the budget in the country.

According to him, issue of budget is so important in Nigeria, although it is also controversial when we always look at the national budget because the money is so humongous.

“But while I was preparing and looking at the context of discussing budget in Nigeria, I realized also there are about 60 agencies that their budget alone is more than 60 per cent of our national budget.

“I saw that the budget of Central Bank of Nigeria alone for this year is about two trillion and many other agencies, like Customs, they are not captured in the national budget and when you put their budget all together is about 60 per cent of the national budget.

“Secondly, closely related with the issue of the budget, is also the issue of accountability and transparency because most of these budgets are being implemented by Ministries, Departments and Agencies, in most cases they are not accountable, and that have been pointed out clearly,” he said.

Wabba, however, said it was high time to move forward and ensure that the scarce resources that are available are budgeted year in year out.

“Let us see how they can make impact. Budget system is like ritual, every year we come we make the ritual and it goes.

“For instance, the year ending 2019, what is the performance of the budget, where are those projects located, can we actually see the projects. These are issues that we need to address,” he said.

He said that NLC and its affiliates would partner with the office of the AGF on issues raised with hope of achieving results.

He added that part of fighting corruption was to ensure that the scarce resources were managed in a way that citizens benefit and it addresses the issue of inequality, issue of poverty and unemployment.

Mr Samuel Omenka, Techical Advisor to the Director General, Budget Office of the Federation, said that the introduction of new tools has led to the improvement of budgeting system in the country.

He said that the office was making more efforts to ensure accountability and transparency in the budgeting system.

Mr Amaechi Asugwuni, NLC Deputy National President said the meeting was to acquaint participants with issues surrounding budgeting in Nigeria.

He said the budgeting session was organised to allow Nigerians and workers review the processes of budgeting.

“It is to put the government in check, believing that since we are already discussing their error in the past, in the forthcoming budgeting they should pick some lessons,”he said.