President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday ordered the review of the revenue reporting template for the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC).
The Presidential order was conveyed by the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, while giving a breakdown on how the N821.9 billion June revenue accrual was distributed to tiers of government.
The minister said that the order came after the President had been briefed about the crisis generated by the alleged under-remittance of revenue by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) into the Federation Account during the FAAC meetings.
She explained: “As you are aware, in the last couple of FAAC meetings, the accounts presented by NNPC were not acceptable by the states and so Mr President asked to be briefed on the issue. Based on that briefing, Mr President asked for further information to be provided by both the Ministry of Finance and the NNPC.
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“Last Thursday, he held a meeting with myself, the Chief of Staff, the Minister of State for Petroleum and the NNPC team. Mr President gave some certain directives, one which relates to FAAC, is the need to revise the template.
“It was ascertained that the reporting template between the NNPC and FAAC was not providing the right level of assurance around the figures. It is for this reason that he has directed that a new template be generated jointly between the Ministry of Finance, the office of the Accountant-General, NNPC and RMAFC”, Adeosun added.
The minister disclosed further that the President also directed that henceforth, before FAAC meetings, a team from the Ministry of Finance and the NNPC should go through the figures and agree before presenting it to FAAC members.
The Chairman, Commissioners of Finance Forum, Mr. Mahmoud Yunusa, was quoted as saying that the state government agreed with the President’s order to review the revenue reporting template of the FAAC.
He said that the Committee would monitor the development with a view to ensuring that its objectives are realized.
Earlier, the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria (ICAN) had presented an Accountability Index to the representatives of the fiscal authorities
The President of the Institute, Razaq Jaiyeola, told the FAAC members that the Accountability Index was designed to ensure prudent management of public funds by focusing on policy- based fiscal forecasting and budget, scrutiny and audit, budget credibility and management of assets and debts.
Specifically, the accounting expert assured that the adoption of the index would ensure improved transparency in public finance and quality of governance in the country.
