2023: Makinde Presents N310b Budget of Sustainable Devt to Oyo Assembly

…..Infrastructure, health, education top proposal

Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde on Thursday presented a proposal of N310billion for the 2023 fiscal year to the state House of Assembly.
The proposal christened “Budget of Sustainable Development”, according to the governor is an indication of movement from accelerated to sustainable development.

He described the sustainable development as the aim of the government to meet the needs of the people of the state on the side of the transition without compromising the ability of the next administration to meet their own needs.
He premised the budget on proposed Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) of N83.5billion; statutory allocation capped at N50billion and Value Added Tax (VAT) puts at N60billion in addition to other streams of income.

While the proposal puts the capital expenditure at N154. 348billion, representing 49.79 percent of the total budget proposal for the 2023 fiscal year, the recurrent expenditure (50.21 percent) stands at N155.651billion.

According to the proposal, Infrastructure got the highest allocation of N85.7billion which represents 27.65 percent of the budget proposal.
This is followed by education which got N58. 2billion (18.78%), Healthcare N36.3billion (11.73%) and Agriculture which is put at N11.1billion which is 3.61% of the total budget.

Makinde said the government allocated more funds to infrastructure as a sure path to accelerated development, and his efforts at continuing in that stride for sustainable development.

He added that the state has maintained its record of allocating funds for education that conform to UNESCO standards of 15-20 percent of the budget.

He recounted that his administration in previous years carried out various projects and efforts that led to an increase of the monthly IGR from N1.7billion in 2018 to a monthly average of about N3.3billion and N5.1billion with special items in 2022.

Speaking on the budget performance up to the third quarter of the year 2022, Makinde lamented that although, the administration may not have attained its projected budgetary performance of 70 to 75 percent, it had doubled the performance from the years before he came into office.

“So far, we have achieved a revenue performance of 59.78 percent and an expenditure performance of 54.88 percent. Of course, we expect to go above the 60 percent mark at the close of the year.
“We believe that our people deserve good governance and that we must deliver good governance to them to the very end of our tenure.
“So, just as we did in 2020 and 2021, we held town hall meetings in all seven geopolitical zones to get the input of the good people of Oyo State into this budget. Again, we have a budget which reflects the wishes of our people.

“I have the honour of presenting the proposal for the Three Hundred and Ten Billion Naira (310,000,000,000) 2023 Budget of Sustainable Development.
“So, with this budget, we are moving from accelerated to sustainable development. Sustainable development means that we aim to meet the needs of the good people of Oyo State on this side of the transition without compromising the ability of the next administration to meet their own needs”, Makinde said.
In his remarks, Speaker of the Assembly, Adebo Ogundoyin expressed optimism that the budget will be used to “solidify and consolidate on the development foundation laid since 2019 by this administration which has given us an edge over all past administrations in Oyo State especially interms of infrastructural growth, educational development and socio-economic transformation.”

He appealled to all heads of Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to get set for the defence of their budget proposals before the standing committees of the House.
Ogundoyin said “Our budget has always been people and development centered and the 2023 appropriation which is to the tune of N310billion is surely not going to be an exception.
“We can say without any fear of contradiction that the budget of the outgoing year 2022 recorded outstanding performances. Kudos to all stakeholders for ensuring the successful implementation and execution of the budget.
“I like to assure us that on our part, we will again be aggressive in performing our duties in ensuring complete implementation and monitoring of the 2023 budget to achieve its set goals and desired results. We will maintain necessary checks on all arms of government and we will not compromise on democratic ethics and ideals.

“To demonstrate our readiness for the task ahead, I want to appeal to all Heads of Ministries, Departments and Agencies MDAs to get set for the defence of their budget proposals before the standing committees of the House.
“I therefore wish to express optimism that with all hands on deck, the 2023 Budget proposal will record a higher level of performance than the 2022 budget.”
The budget presentation was attended by top government functionaries, traditional rulers community leaders, sectoral leaders, trade unions and artisans groups, party leaders among other stakeholders.