Participants at the transparency survey launch for the Northeast held in Gombe.
By Akanji Alowolodu, Gombe
Though the Civil Resource Development and Documentation Centre (CIRDDOC), has commended the improved transparency in budgeting in the North-Eastern States of the federation, Auditors- General of the states were chided for not submitting midterm reports emanating from citizens engagement on the budget performance.
According to the North-East Zonal Coordinator of CIRDDOC, Mrs Dudu Mamman Manuga, “The issue of transparency has tremendously improved unlike when we started in 2015 because now every day has a website and they put up their documents on those website. Not, all the documents that we are looking for are there and when they are there (online) they are there in good time because there is a timeline”.
Dudu Mamman Manuga was speaking during the North East States 2020 budget transparency survey launch organized with support from Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Responsible Citizenship and Human Development Initiative.
She said that Already, Yobe State has been rated as number one among other North-East States budget transparency, according to a survey conducted by CIRDDOC noting that although a number of states have functional websites, some still do not have the requisite details of some aspect of budget online.
She bemoaned the failure of states to publish mid-year review, a six month report on the budget saying that the Auditor Generals of all the states failed to engage the citizens of each of the states.
She said, “when citizens want to do something or intervene, unfortunately, not all are always online in good time. Some states don’t do citizens’ budget, where it is broken down using infographics, or the use of languages that citizens can understand” .
She added that, Some states don’t do this. Some states do not do call circular, they feel it is not important. The criteria for scoring this year (2020) hinged on public availability. It should be on the website”.
Dudu Manuga also decried the non domestication of the Freedom of Information (FOI) act in the entire northeast States adding also that States don’t also have the mid-year review which is different from a report because a report is performance which has what came in and out stressing that a mid-year review is an assessment of how the budget performed looking at the past six months.”
The Coordinator, also warned against movement of funds from Ministries, Departments and Agencies that have been appropriated without recourse to the House of Assembly for virement.
She said, “Auditors- General are supposed to hold their public hearings at their own stages before they submit their reports to the House of Assembly. I think it is only Yobe State that does that in the entire North East” .
“We need the office of the Auditor-Generals to open up small and engage citizens. The public account committee does not hold public hearing on the auditors’ report. So we need the committee to open up and engage the citizens and when they have the report it should be put online for the purpose of the survey”, she said.
She also said that,, “If there is going to be any plus minus, they should go back to the House of Assembly, they are supposed to know and approve that the money can move from ministry A – B. May be there is a greater need like we had Covid-19 challenge last year. This is because it is an appropriation law, you don’t just play with the law without going to the lawmakers to give an approval. A lot of them claim to do it but we don’t see it online”.
Also speaking, Zainab Saleh, Director Budget, Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning Yobe State, said that the survey gave researchers opportunity to know how citizens were carried along in budget process, adding that the network of civil society organisations operating in the state aided the performance.
On his part, Dr. Yusuf Abashi, CIRDDOC’s Bauchi State Researcher noted that citizens input were not captured in 2020 budget formulation, noting that the state was low because a lot of things were not made open for the public.
“In the North East we have a long way to go presently. Yes, there is a level of involvement but it is too insignificant the people are the most important contributors in the budget. Until the responsibility is implemented we will be far behind. Budget should be from the people upward and not from up to bottom”, he stated.
