Allocations from the Federation Account to the three tiers of government increased by N65.15bn from N400bn shared in December 2016 to N465.15bn in January this year, according to figures released by the Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) on Tuesday.
There was also an increase of N76.27bn in gross statutory revenue from N248.63bn in December 2016 to N324.99bn in the month of January.
These came out of the FAAC meeting for the month of January, which was held on Tuesday at the headquarters of the Federal Ministry of Finance.
Addressing journalists shortly after the meeting, which started at about 4pm, the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Finance, Mahmoud Dutse, attributed the increase in revenue to improvement in the volume and price of crude oil.
For instance, he said there was an increase of $74.91m in federation export sales due to a rise in the volume of crude oil exports by 1.49 million barrels and an increase in the average price of crude oil from $47.3 to $49.57 per barrel during the period under review.
“Federation revenue increased despite the force majeure and shutdown of pipelines for repairs and maintenance due to leakages and sabotage,” Dutse explained.
He added that Petroleum profit tax collection rose significantly, while revenues from companies income tax, value added tax, import duty and royalty decreased slightly.
In terms of allocation to the three tiers of government, the permanent secretary said the increase in revenue had a positive impact on the amount distributed.
For instance, in terms of statutory allocation of N273.45bn, he said the Federal Government received the sum of N133.19bn; states, N67.55bn; and local governments, N52.08bn
In addition, Dutse said the sum of N20.62bn was allocated to the oil producing states based on the 13 per cent principle of derivation.
For VAT, N70.58bn was distributed, with sum of N10.58bn allocated to the Federal Government; states, N35.29bn; while the local government councils got N24.7bn.
The permanent secretary put the balance in the Excess Crude Account as of February 21 at $2.45bn.
