Nation
New Revenue Sharing Formula Ready, Dec -RMAFC
The Chairman, Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), Mr Elias Mbam, on Wednesday said the new revenue allocation formula would be ready for approval by December.
Mbam made this known in an interview with newsmen in Abuja.
The chairman said that the commission would present the new plan as a recommended formula to President Goodluck Jonathan for consideration and afterwards it would be passed to the National Assembly to be approved as law.
“We expect that by December before the end of the year, we present to Mr President our recommendation of the formula on revenue sharing for onward transmission to the National Assembly for further discussion.
“We have progressed much, we have done several studies of fiscal matters, we have toured other federations to compare their fiscal arrangements and be able to get their experiences and use the experience as part of what we can apply in our own case.
“Also we have sensitised the people and collected data from 774 local governments, and the 36 states and also the FCT. And then we have done a literature review of all fiscal arrangements that had been done before independence till date.
“So we have all the records and we are in the process of commissioning a lead consultant. And the next stage we are in is to carry out zonal advocacy. We have gone to all states to sensitise them, we have consulted elders; we have consulted opinion leaders, we have consulted Civil Societies.
“And so, what we are to do next after we have visited all the zones is to bring all the reports together, analyse them and then come up with a position of majority of Nigerians.“
Mbam said that the present formula needed to be reviewed because a lot had changed since it was designed 21 years ago.
He added that though President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration modified the formula a bit to conform to the 1999 Constitution and it needed to be further revised.
“The constitution says that after five years, a commission should look at changing realities. What has changed within that period, does it require a review in terms of what was due for Mr A, for Mr B.
“If you look at the present formula, the last time it was reviewed actually was 1992 and from 1992 till now, it’s almost 21 years, and you can agree with me that since 1992 till now, a lot have changed.
“The population has changed; all the indices used in determining the formula have changed. So because of these changes, we need to update the record, we need to also know what are the main challenges of socio economy of Nigeria.
“When we are talking about revenue allocation formula, we are considering two levels of sharing; one is among the three tiers of government, the Federal Government, the state government and the local government.
“These three levels have percentages; the Federal Government will take its own percentage, fortunately, it is not sharing with anybody.
“But when they give the states their own percentages, they now have to share within the states. Each state gets 26.7 per cent for instance, what per cent of that will go to Anambra, to Sokoto, to Borno.
“That sharing among those states and among the local governments, within their own percentage allocation is what we call horizontal allocation.
“But among the three levels of government, the federal, state and local government is what we call the vertical sharing, but many people are only concerned about the vertical but it is also important to look at the horizontal.“
The Chairman of Malumfashi Local Government Council of Katsina State, Maharazu Dayi, has been impeached.
Maharazu Dayi was impeached yesterday by 11 out of 12 councillors, barely two days before the local government elections in the State.
The councillors reportedly took action following allegations of misconduct and poor governance against the chairman after a dispute over the distribution of the council’s Paris Club funds.
The development has sent shock waves across the local government area, especially as the impeached chairman is among those who failed to secure the ticket of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to contest in the forthcoming election.
The Rumuwoji Ultra Modern Market Traders Association, Mile 1, Port Harcourt, has urged the state government to utilise the available spaces within the area to build phase 3 of the Rumuwoji Market in order to solve the ever increasing needs of traders.
The association, which said this at a media briefing in Port Harcourt, also described as a welcomed development the decision by the state Governor to open the phase 2 of the market for business.
According to the association, “We consider it as an answer to the various cries of the people, because he is a man on a mission who is out to place the interest of Rivers people first. It is a dream come true for the first time for the market to be dully allocated and open for business”
Chairman of the association, Hon Godspower Wobo, who briefed the press shortly after a meeting of the association in Port Harcourt, also urged the public to disregard the activities of some persons whose stock in trade is to cause disaffection in the market.
He said the attention of the association was drawn to the activities of some strange fellows who went about misforming the people about situation in the market, stressing that apart from his association, no other group exists in the market except subdiary unions.
Wobo also tasked the reallocation committee to tread with caution so as to avoid being deceived by any group.
According to him, time has come for the state government to engage in robust discussion with aggrieved shop owners who went to court and those who paid monies to the state coffers and issued with allocation certificates for the overall interest of peace.
He also advised the public to deal directly with his association, stressing that the meeting was to review activities for the last year as well as unveil their new Constitution.
Also speaking, former Chairman of the association, Deacon Kenneth Eze urged the Rivers State Governor, Sir Siminalayi Fubara to open the phase 2 of the market, as it is long overdue.
Eze who is the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the association also urged the public to do business with only the Rumuwoji Ultra Modern Market Traders Association as it is the only union recognised by the traders.
The President of the African Development Bank (AfDB), Akinwunmi Adesina, has debunked reports linking him with the race for Nigeria’s presidency in 2027.
Reacting to the report on his X handle yesterday, following a recent interview with Arise TV, the AfDB boss said his quotes were misrepresented and misinterpreted in several Nigerian media reports.
However, the AfDB president denied the media reports, stating that he never said that he wanted to contest for President.
“A segment of my recent interview on @Arise TV has been both misinterpreted and misrepresented in several Nigerian media outlets. What I said was, “I will be available to serve in any capacity, globally, in Africa, anywhere, including my own country.”
“A listen to the substantive and robust interview, which is available online, will show this to be the case. For clarity and for the record, I did not say that I am running for the office of President of Nigeria,” Adesina said.