FAAC disbursements hit five-year high but can’t fund states’ budget

The 2019 budgets of 33 states may suffer a setback as the disbursements from the federation account allocation committee (FAAC) would be insufficient.

The possible exceptions are Lagos, Rivers and Ogun states, which have a considerable history of high internally generated revenue (IGR).

An analysis of the disbursements made by the committee between July and September showed that they were the highest since the third quarter of 2014 and the first time since Q4 2018 that the disbursements will exceed N2 trillion in a quarter.

The analysis, which was carried out using data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), was released in Abuja on Monday.

FAAC was reported to have disbursed N2.273 trillion between the three tiers of government and other statutory recipients during the review period.

During the review period, the federal government received N920.2 billion while the states and local government received N724.16 billion and N44.19 respectively.

The disbursement was 18.79% higher than the N1.913 trillion disbursed in the second quarter of 2019 and 17.81% higher than the N1.929 trillion disbursed in the first quarter of the year.

“The last time this happened was in the third quarter of 2014,” a statement released alongside the report read.

“This is a big improvement compared to N886.48 billion recorded in 2016 Q2. However, it is still lower than N2.607 trillion of 2013 Q1.”

On disbursements to the states, the NEITI quarterly review said it noticed a wide disparity between Osun state (which received the lowest amount of N6.89 billion) and Delta state that got the highest disbursement of N54.88 billion.

This implied that Delta state received almost eight times what Osun state got.

The review also showed that the four states with the highest net disbursements, which were all in the south-south geopolitical zone, received a combined total of N173.65 billion.

This was more than the combined total of N164.58 billion received by the 14 states with the lowest disbursement.