Stakeholders working to improve citizens engagement in budget formulation and implementation in Kaduna State have decried the poor capital budget performance in education and the health sectors.
The stakeholders made the observation at the end of a two-day Budget Trend Analysis of key service delivery sectors namely education, health and infrastructure between 2016 and 2020.
Participants at the meeting include Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), media, House of Assembly and some representatives of the state’s Ministries, Departments and Agencies.
The meeting was supported by the DFID-Funded Partnership to Engage, Reform and Learn (PERL) working to improve governance and citizens engagement in the state.
The budget trend analysis obtained by News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Kaduna on Friday, shows a poor performance of the education and health capital budget within the period.
The analysis shows that N27.98 billion was allocated for capital projects in 2016, but only N15.13 billion was spent, representing 54 per cent budget performance.
The allocation increased to N44.85 billion in 2017, of which only N6.13 billion was spent, representing 14 per cent performance.
In 2018, the allocation for capital project in the sector dropped to N31.71 billion and only N7.57 billion was spent, representing 24 per cent.
The story was no different in the health sector, where N6.66 billion was allocated in 2016 for capital projects but only N1.62 billion was spent.
In 2017, N10.49 billion was allocated but only N3.11 billion was spent, while in 2018, N17 billion was allocated but only N5.57 billion was spent.
However, the infrastructure sector witnessed an impressive performance when compared to the education and health sectors.
The analysis shows that the sector got N30.14 billion capital budget allocation in 2016 and spent N22.33 billion, representing 74.11 per cent performance.
The allocation increased to N29.39 billion in 2017 with actual spending of N13.08 billion, representing 44.50 per cent budget performance.
In 2018, the allocation slightly decreased to N27.79 billion, while the actual spending was N32.22 billion, representing 115.9 per cent, an impressive budget performance, 15 per cent higher than the actual allocation.
The stakeholders blamed the poor budget performance on unrealistic budget of the state government, accompanied by unmet projected revenue.
They also noted that while there was some level of citizens participation in governance under the Open Government Partnership platforms, citizens engagement in the budget processes was still low.
They agreed to mobilise citizens to effectively monitor and track the implementation of the 2020 budget and put structures in place for early engagement of the 2021 budget process.
Mr Yusuf Goje of the Coalition of Associations for Leadership, Peace, Empowerment and Development (CALPED), particularly noted the weak communication and engagement of the citizens by infrastructure agencies in the past four years.
Goje also acknowledged the weak civil society engagement in tracking infrastructure projects in the state and called for the establishment of accountability mechanism made up of government officials and civil society.
According to him, the move will ensure effective tracking and monitoring of budget releases and implementation of infrastructure for accountability.
“The government should also intensify its public relations engagement by providing details of projects for citizens to take ownership.”
Similarly, Dr Elisha Menson, of the Department of Economics, Kaduna State University (KASU), described budget as a “vital instrument of governance”.
Menson stressed the need for the government to increase the level of citizens engagement in the budget process.
Also, Mr Bako Usman, President, Campaign for Democracy (CD), said that citizens engagement should start at the grassroots.
Mr Abel Adejor, PERL Lead in the state, explained that the meeting was organised to analysed key service delivery sectors and implementation performance.
Adejor added that the meeting was also organised to review citizens engagement in the 2020 budget and plan for effective engagement of the 2021 budget process. (NAN)
