By NEFISHETU YAKUBU

The Minister of State for Finance, Doris Anite-Uzoka, on Thursday announced plans to begin payments for the 2024 and 2025 capital budgets to ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs).

Anite-Uzoka made this disclosure while defending the ministry’s 2026 budget proposal before the Senate Committee on Appropriation in Abuja.

Her clarification followed persistent questions from senators seeking updates on the status of capital releases for 2024 and 2025 to various MDAs.

The lawmakers expressed concern that nearly all MDAs appearing before Senate committees reported zero releases for their 2024 and 2025 capital allocations.

In response, the minister said she had convened a stakeholder engagement with Permanent Secretaries and Accounting Officers across MDAs to address the funding delays.

She explained that the meeting was convened to notify the agencies that the ministry was ready to begin payments, pending the submission of their cash plans.

According to her, outstanding payments under the 2024 capital budget would begin immediately, as financial approvals had already been secured.

She added that payments under the 2025 capital budget would also begin, but MDAs would be required to upload their cash plans before disbursement.

“So, as of today, all outstanding payments for the 2024 and 2025 capital budgets will commence,” she said.

Also speaking, the Chairman of the Nigeria Revenue Service, Zacch Adedeji, attributed the challenges in funding the budget to unrealistic revenue projections.

Adedeji argued that budget efficiency was determined not by its size but by the government’s capacity to execute funded projects.

He warned that “overestimating revenue inevitably produces spending plans that cannot be financed, regardless of the payment structure adopted.”

According to him, the government has begun shifting toward more realistic budgeting anchored on actual revenue-generation capacity.

He emphasised that projections must reflect the portion of oil revenue genuinely available to the government for expenditure.

Adedeji explained that the Nigerian National Petroleum Company ( NNPC) Limited “now operates as a limited liability company rather than a federal corporation.”

He stated that government earnings from the NNPC are limited to taxes and royalties, not total production output.

“Therefore, oil revenue estimates must be based on realistic production costs and net returns rather than gross output figures,” he said.

The committee chairman, Solomon Adeola (Ogun West), expressed concern over weak revenue performance and widening projection gaps.

He cited discrepancies between 18 per cent performance in one fiscal year and a 36.5 per cent projection for 2025.

Adeola questioned whether the economic team had confidence in its assumptions and asked whether the proposed N58.472 trillion 2026 budget should be reduced.

He warned that rising debt-servicing costs required urgent measures, including possible asset sales to reduce borrowing and future interest burdens.

Earlier, the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun, presented an overview of the 2025 budget performance and a breakdown of the proposed 2026 estimates. (NAN)

Update news