Kwara State Governor, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed, Thursday presented an estimated budget proposal of N157billion for the 2019 fiscal year.
He said the budget estimate was a marginal increase of over N1billion to that of 2018.
Presenting the Appropriation Bill to the state House of Assembly yesterday, Ahmed said, “out of the total budget size, a total sum of over N77 billion is for recurrent expenditure while a total sum of N79 billion is for capital expenditure.”
He explained that, “sectoral allocation of the budget proposal of over N157 billion shows that, economic affairs sector has the highest allocation of over N54 billion or 34.6 per cent, followed by the general public service of over N32 billion or 22.6 per cent, while education sector has over N28billion or 18 per cent and health sector of over N27 billion or 17.5 per cent.
“This is an indication of our commitment to the priority sectors of our administration on the need to add more values to the socio-economic development and growth of Kwara state.”
He said that, “the primary sources of revenue available to the state government to finance the proposed estimated budget of 2019 will be through expectations of statutory federal allocations put at over N49 billion, Value Added Tax of over N11 billion, internally generated revenue of over N33 billion, income from other sundry internal sources of over N250 million, capital development fund of over N30 billion, among others”.
He stressed that, the 2019 budget proposal would also take care of total recurrent expenditure that was put at over N77 billion.
The budget which will be the last of this outgoing administration to be presented at the state House of Assembly, according to the governor, was anchored on the desire to consolidate and sustain the significant achievements recorded by this administration in the past years.
Ahmed opined that, “I wish to note that the 2019 draft budget is designed to focus on the successful completion of the ongoing projects and the effective implementation of programmes and projects that have direct bearing the peoples well-being.
“This direction will be enable the government to consolidate the gains of the past years in the provision of social amenities for the people of the state.”
In his remark, the Speaker of the House of Assembly, Hon. Ali Ahmad lauded the efforts of the government to make life more bearable for the residents of the state in the area of delivery and implementation of budget every year.
He, however, assured that the lawmakers would quickly look into the budget so as to pass it into law before the end of this month, so as to allow the governor sign it into law for implementation and the overall benefit of the people of the state.
