Cover 2:
FAAC: No money to share as NNPC fails to remit funds
By Chika Otuchikere
The Federal Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) meeting failed to hold on Tuesday because of paucity of funds in the national treasury to share by the federal, states and local governments in the federation.
FAAC meets every month to distribute the revenue realised and kept centrally among the three tiers of government.
Yesterdaya��s meeting could not hold because the major revenue-spinning agency, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) failed to remit the needed funds to the Federation Account. Ita��s earnings forms the bulk of the revenue of the federation.
The FAAC meeting was earlier fixed for Monday, but was shifted to Tuesday to enable the NNPC brief the Council and remit the needed funds. But when it was apparent that the corporation had not tidied up its ends, the meeting was abruptly cancelled and postponed sine die.
Before the cancellation of the meeting, the various states commissioners of Finance and journalists had gathered at the auditorium of the Finance Ministry for the monthly ritual.
The Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF), Ahmed Idris, who usually presides over the meeting, announced that they could not disburse the allocation for February because the NNPC had failed to remit its statutory revenue generated during the period.
The development may cause civil servants across the country to spend this yeara��s Easter celebrations without salaries.
The mood in the hall was that of disappointment and despondency as the commissioners began to file out with their heads bowed down.
Idris did not say when the February allocation would eventually be shared.
FAAC which met in February to share the January allocation, distributed N635.554 billion to the federal, states and local governments, as revenue generated in January.
The AGF had said that the Federal Government received a total of N263 billion, while the 36 states of the federation received N172.872 billion, and the local governments collected N129.985 billion.
Meanwhile, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has issued notice of the suspended Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) Meeting, saying it would hold between 3rd and 4th of April 2019. This followed the recent confirmation of the members of the committee by the Senate.