The Senate yesterday decried yearly dwindling budgetary allocations to the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) which by available records, have dropped from N109 billion it was in 2008 to as low as N30 billion allocated for it in the 2017 fiscal year. This was even as the upper legislative chamber wondered why, out of the N30 billion allocation appropriated for the FCT as capital votes, only N12.19 billion was released by the Ministry of Finance. Dwindling yearly budgetary allocations for FCT came to the fore during 2018 budget defence session the FCT Minister, Alhaji Mohammed Musa Bello, had before the Senate Committee on FCT.
The minister in his submissions, said out of the N30 billion given to FCT in the 2017 fiscal year, only N12.19 billion was released, representing 40.1 per cent budget performance as far as execution of capital projects is concerned. He, however, disclosed that the 2018 budgetary allocation for FCT is N40 billion, which according to him, is not enough for the execution of proposed critical infrastructural projects across the territory.
He explained that 27 of the projects are being prioritised based on projected allocations. Worried by the submission of the minister, the chairman of the committee, Senator Dino Melaye (APC, Kogi West), decried the situation whereby only about 41 per cent of the current 2017 budget has so far been implemented with regards to capital expenditure. He therefore urged the federal government to prioritise the FCT budget because of its strategic position and role as far the image and development of the country is concerned. According to him, the yearly dwindling budgetary allocation to FCT is unacceptable.
