The World Bank’s funded States Fiscal Transparency, Accountability and Sustainability (SFTAS) programmes has award 20.4 million dollars to Cross River State in Southern Nigeria.
SFTAS is a programme of the World Bank run in collaboration with the Nigerian government to encourage states to improve internally generated revenue, increase fiscal efficiency in public expenditure and reduce debt burdens.
On meeting the criteria, Asuquo Ekpenyong Jr., the Cross River State Commissioner for Finance in a parley with newsmen in Calabar the state capital said, “Cross River State Government working through the SFTAS steering committee strengthened the Internally Generated Revenue, implemented biometric registration to reduce payroll and improved procurement practices for transparency and value for money.
“It strengthened its public debt management and fiscal responsibility framework, improved its debt sustainability and instituted and enhance a more transparent budgeting process over the course of the fiscal year.”
According to him, Cross River met 6 out of 9 applicable Disbursement Linked Indicators for 2019 and 3 out of 3 for 2020 to become eligible for the more than 20 million USD grant.
“Cross River met the eligibility criteria for 2019 programme and was pre-qualified for the detailed annual performance assessment exercise, which was conducted in September 2020 by independent verification assessors from the office of the Auditor General of the Federation,” noted Ekpenyong.
The Finance Commissioner appreciated the efforts of the SFTAS state steering committee, noting that the team surmounted several challenges and leveraged on the technical strength of the civil service to achieve success.
He also commended Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari and Governor Ben Ayade for ensuring that Cross River achieved eligibility criteria for the grant despite the negative impact of Covid-19 on overall revenue generation.
The next round
The Commissioner disclosed that the state had started the process for the next round of grant programmes, noting “the eligibility criteria for the next round are publishing the 2019 audited financial statement of the state before the end of July 2020, Cross River has achieved this.
“Publishing online the 2021 budget before the end of January 31, 2021. Cross River State is well on its way to achieving this.
“We have passed our budget and currently undergoing a very comprehensive technical session in Abuja and we are going to beat the deadline.
“Due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Nigerian Government and World Bank introduced new disbursement linked indicators with grants attached on achievement,” hinted Ekpenyong.
IRS contribution
Also speaking, the Executive Chairman of the Cross River State Internal Revenue Service, Mr Akpanke Ogar said that due to the impact of covid-19 in 2020, the agency introduced tax rebate as part of its strategy to improve the business environment and strengthen revenue collection.
“Cross River is the only state that has a Tax Exemption Law in Nigeria. We know that personal income tax by law is administered by the Nigerian Government, but the state government introduced the law exempting certain class of people from personal income tax,” he said.
He insisted that the law was the vision of Governor Ayade because it was introduced six years earlier to strengthen revenue generation, noting “we also have recently the Anti-Tax Agency to stop extortionists and eliminate double taxation.”
Suzan O
