The Kaduna State Government says it will give priority to projects that were unlikely to be completed and paid for in its 2020 budget.
Mr Thomas Gyang, Commissioner, Planning and Budget Commissioner, made this know in the 2020-2022 Multi-Year Budget Call Circular, obtained by the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Kaduna on Saturday.
“Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) are advised to ensure that all ongoing projects that are unlikely to be completed and paid for in 2019 are captured in their 2020 Budget.
“Where ongoing projects exceed budget ceilings, they should be spread into 2021 and 2022 columns of the Multi-Year Budget.
“New projects are not to be integrated into the 2020 budget except priority projects of utmost importance,” Gyang said.
He also requested all MDAs to be guided by the state Development Plan 2016 to 2020 in coming up with programmes and projects to ensure coherent development across the state.
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According to him, the administration will continue to focus on economic development, social welfare, security and justice and good governance.
“In preparing the budget, financial resources will be strictly dedicated to meet the objectives outlined in the State Development Plan as it relates to each sector.
“Therefore, MDAs will focus on delivering the outputs and strategies that will deliver the outcomes specified in the development plan.
“Resources should be allocated starting from the highest priority activities and continuing in sequence down to lower priority activities until the budget ceiling is reached.”
To give room for community participation in the budget process, the commissioner advised the MDAs to engage civil society organisations, community-based organisations and relevant stakeholders in drawing up their budgets.
He, however, stressed that inputs from such engagement should be in line with the aspirations of the state government as contained in the state’s development plan.
He also advised the MDAs against presenting over-ambitious budgets, adding that previous budget implementation rates have provided ample evidence of absorptive capacity issues across MDAs and the revenue generating capacity of the state.
“The government wants to facilitate service delivery which cannot be achieved without appreciable funding due to consistent dependence on statutory allocation from the Federation Account that has been dwindling over the years.
“This underscores the need for the Revenue Generating Agencies to perform maximally for the state to meet the challenging and obviously increasing demands of its citizens.
“To improve revenue generation, Kaduna State Internal Revenue Service is being repositioned alongside the review of revenue laws that governs revenue generation in the state.
“MDAs are, therefore, required to submit realistic and implementable multi-year budget estimates for the 2020 budget, based on the state revenue potentials outlined in the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework 2020 to 2022.”
Gyang directed all MDAs to submit detailed budget proposals to the Planning and Budget Commission by Sept. 17, while budget defence would be held between Sept. 24 and Sept. 29.
