• August earnings dip to N760b

Federal Government’s total gross revenue for eight months ended August stood at N6.61 trillion, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) monthly Economic Report released yesterday has shown.

The figure which covers January to August reflects a decrease of 12.5 and 10.7 per cent below the budget estimate for the period and the receipts in the corresponding period of last year respectively.

Of the cumulative earnings, oil receipts represented 71.9 per cent, while non-oil receipts accounted for the balance of 28.1 per cent.

But the report also showed that government earnings for August slumped to N760.29 billion, a decline of 27.6 per cent over the N1.05 trillion earned in July. The decline relative to the level in the preceding month was attributed to the fall in oil revenue during the review.

At N457.23 billion, gross oil receipts, which constituted 60.1 per cent of the total revenue, dipped below both the receipts in the preceding month and the monthly budget estimate by 29.2 and 29.1 per cent respectively. This development was largely attributed to the shortfall in receipts from exports and other oil revenue during the period.

According to the report, there was N303.06 billion gross non-oil receipts, which constituted 39.9 per cent of total receipt and was 0.9 per cent above the monthly budget estimate. This was however lower than the level in the preceding month by 25.1 per cent.

The increase in non-oil revenue relative to the receipts in the preceding month reflected the rise in receipts from corporate and education taxes.

CBN said of the gross federally-collected revenue during the month, N477.05 billion was transferred to the Federation Account for distribution among the three tiers of government and the 13 per cent Derivation Fund.

The Federal Government received N227.52 billion, while the state and local governments received N115.40 billion and N88.97 billion, respectively. The balance of N45.17 billion went to the 13 per cent Derivation Fund for distribution to the oil-producing states.

According to the apex bank’s report, the Federal Government received N10.68 billion from the Value Added Tax (VAT) Pool Account, while the state and local governments received N35.61 billion and N24.93 billion respectively.

Also, the sum N35.55 billion was distributed as the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme (SURE-P) among the three tiers of government and the 13 per cent Derivation Fund.

There was also N261.88 billion, which was the estimated Federal Government retained revenue for August. This was lower than both the receipts in the preceding month and monthly budget estimate by 10.3 and 35.9 per cent respectively.

Of this amount, the Federation Account accounted for 86.9 per cent, while SURE-P, VAT, and Federal Government Independent Revenue accounted for 6.2, 4.1 and 2.8 per cent respectively.

Estimated total receipts by state governments from the Federation and VAT Pool Accounts stood at N213.80 billion. This was lower than the level in the preceding month by 22.8 per cent, but was higher than the level in the corresponding period of 2012 by 57.1 per cent.