The National Assembly has increased the 2021 budget by an extra ₦549bn, with the National Social Investment Programmes take 66% of the increment; NSIP since its inception met unemployment at 53.7%, and now it stands at 40.1%; The allocation speaks to a needs assessment challenge with Nigeria’s budgeting; In all, the budget increment may be unrealistic, given a handicap in revenue generation.
National Social Investment Programmes (NSIP) bag ₦365 billion of the extra ₦549 billion National Assembly approved in the Budget. Earlier, Dataphyte noted NASS grabbed ₦6 billion of a ₦12 billion statutory transfer. In all, the increments favoured operational institutions, leaving the vital developmental agencies out to dry. The same trend continues.
The NSIP consists of the N-power and the Government Enterprise and Empowerment Programme (GEEP). But while the NSIP is altruistic, the operationalism around it or better yet, its effectiveness has not. The Muhammed Buhari administration ushered the NSIP to battle unemployment and poverty. But since its inception in 2016, poverty escalated from 53.7% to over 40.1% in 2020. Not to mention unemployment rose from 7.06% in 2016 to 27.% by 2020. Hence, is it prudent to give 66% of the budget increase to a social welfare initiative that has not worked in almost half a decade?
In the end, it goes back to the point of needs assessment before allocation. Dataphyte, on several occasions, has noted how the assignment is seemingly done whimsically, rather than strategically. On the other spectrum is the implementation challenge. Starting initiatives in Nigeria has never been an issue the problem is following up or appraising and reviewing these enterprises.
Nigeria cannot implement the budget- Experts
For Samuel Atiku, a public policy analyst, injecting more money into Nigeria’s budget is not the right way to go. And the government cannot finance and implement the yearly fiscal budget, NSIPs budget inclusive. He also noted that Nigeria had not generated more than ₦4 trillion before, yet it has budgeted ₦13 trillion.
“One big issue about Nigeria’s budget is that Nigeria will not make above ₦4 trillion as revenue, historically, we have never made more than that, so this year we are going at the back of revenue to budget ₦13 trillion even with the COVID-19 issue. The budget is overly optimistic, and there is no way the government will fund it, and there are also narrow things to Implement in NSIPs.”Atiku Samuel
By implication, the sum of ₦365 billion allocated to the National Social Investment Programmes, as good as it sounds, might end up becoming a mere talk. Going by the budget feasibility, the NSIPs and some other programmes might not function actively in the fiscal budget.