Before President Muhammad Buhari’s administration officially declared Nigeria in a recession, few months ago, 17 states were reportedly able to meet up with recurrent needs, but, according to BudgIT’s report, only three states can now meet recurrent obligations in Nigeria.
A report released by the organisation titled ‘State of States’ showed that only Lagos, Rivers and Enugu are the states that can fulfill obligations to its workers. The rest are in trouble.
Akwa Ibom reportedly placed last on the table of ability to meet monthly recurrent expenditure commitments followed by Bayelsa, Oyo and Osun, said BudgIT.
Other weak states, according to BudgIT are Ogun, Plateau, Delta, Kwara, Adamawa, Abia, Benue, Bauchi, Jigawa, Kano, Cross River, Kogi, Imo, Ondo, Nassarawa, Yobe, Kaduna, Ekiti, Sokoto Borno and Taraba.
Zamfara, Gombe, Anambra, Niger, Katsina, Ebonyi, Edo and Kebbi were classified as states with fair shortfalls. The report focused on how much revenue is received and generated by the states, the total debt stock and the total recurrent expenditure of the states.
Lagos, Akwa Ibom and Rivers are the states with the highest budget for 2016 while Delta, Lagos and Akwa Ibom are the states with the highest domestic debts.
The table of the external debt profile showed Lagos, Kaduna and Edo at the top of the table with Yobe, Borno and Taraba occupying the bottom spots on the table.
At the second National Executive Committee (NEC), meeting of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), in Abuja on Thursday, March 24, 2016, President Muhammad Buhari dropped the bombshell that 27, out of 36 states, are unable to pay workers’ salaries.
On October 18, 2016, the president reiterated inability of the states to pay salaries, despite collecting bailout funds from Abuja.
At a meeting with the International Committee of the Red Cross President, Mr. Peter Maurer, the president said “about 27 of our 36 states couldn’t pay salaries when we came last year and we are still struggling with that. But, we will get out of it.”
