 Thank you for staying with us. You're still watching the breakfast on plus TV Africa It's time for a hot topic and we'll be looking at the National Assembly passes 2024 budget who raises estimates by 1.2 trillion and Naira now there's been an appropriation bill which was about 27.5 Billion trillion Naira, but now it's been increased to 28 0.7 trillion and Naira by the president But anyways joining us to speak about this and just give us more insight is Frank Eliania Who is a business who's our business? They is the technological news editor at business day. Good morning, Frank Thank you for joining the program Good morning, and thank you for helping me. Happy new year. Happy new year to you. Happy new year Okay, so we're looking as an addition of 1.2 Trillion Naira to our appropriation budget when you saw this was the first thing that jumped at you And how did you feel about this? I mean, we're talking about 27.5 now. We're moving over to 28.7 I think the first thing I did was try to find out what the talks or the idea was from the from National Assembly Some of the reasons that they forward which includes increasing revenue and order three items, you know They kind of didn't add up, you know, but This has become like something that you expect from the National Assembly every year That the budget is made, you know before they passed the budget They often come up with these additions that they put on the budget Even if they hadn't talked about how do we Show up or Account for these additions that we are making but they just go ahead and make it anyway, so So it is expected. So I wasn't really surprised that It is the case again this In this 2024 budget, but then it then raises critical questions which I'm hoping that the government Will answer in 2024 listening to the president's speech this morning where he was saying that he plans to Pursue his tax reform and also and also Tackle everything that Obstructs revenue generation and it's sort of a being hopeful, but then There were some critical things I would have expected to hear from that budget from that new year eve Message which were in there, you know, but It's 2024. So We can look forward to say there's something that might happen that would be that would be different from the disaster that we had in 2023 Okay, so some of the adjustments made included the foreign exchange differential We know what the effects is saying right now. The dollar is At an all-time high if I can say that as well as the pounds and the years So some of these adjustments that is that amounts to the 1.2 trillion is includes foreign exchange differential increasing government owned enterprises revenues personal reduction And what jumped out to me was the foreign The foreign exchange differential are we not supposed to be looking at a way to Bring down the foreign exchange. So to you know, just put up the naira to the dollar It might not be as it used to be like years before but at least something close But if we're still adjusting for this foreign Exchange, what happens to our economy? We're adding more money and guess what most of this money is that you know Are in our budget. We're probably going to borrow them So we're borrowing to make all of this spending. How does that even work? In our economy that we are currently in right now Yeah, so I I think what you're seeing there is The national assembly are adjusting for the worst in 2024 um, they're like just telling you that grazed up, you know fighting your ship belt and um things might get a little bit more bumpy in in in 2024 But then you are You are correct about, you know, actually the questions about how does this even work? We are we are Expecting that production levels or production activities in the economy in 2024 are going to be significantly increased or improved, you know, um, but I'm I'm still not very confident, you know from the from the government's Position and the ability language, you know So it's still not given the kind of vibes that you you need to assure yourself that They are they've got their head in the right direction Which was also where I alluded to the president's speech this morning That speech for me could have been a little bit more thoughtful about issues around cost of governance Around the issues around how the government intends to work with the state because I think that In 2024 the government should prioritize the state governors To ensure that they boost their revenue I'm I'm I'm kind of leaning towards the states to Or rescue the economy from From the place where it is currently, you know, imagine if you have 20 states That are productive imagine if you have 20 states that are that have significantly improved um, their revenue by december 2024 um, the economy will Will be improved by that period But in particularly three what you saw was that um, just a little about Um, four states were able to hit over one million over a hundred million dollars In revenue, you know, so that is abysmal, you know We even had a state with about 12,000 Slightly above the 12,000 dollars that it generated from foreign Direct investment, you know, so it's it is it is a bad place where the states are But it is something that we should prioritize in 2024, you know, look a little bit Away from the federal government. I don't see the federal government, you know Doing so much without the significant impute of the state because Things like payee Taxes if you're going to talk about the taxes that the government is talking about, you know Payee is still with the states. Um, most of the taxes are coming from the states when you talk about payee, you're talking about Employees of companies, you know what they earn, you know that How do you? Increase that tax net without improving employment So if if companies are not employing it means that you have a less Tax to collect from there, you know So you you need the states to be open doing you need every state to Go back to their budget. I saw that many of them passed their budget before December 31st, you know, which is good But then it is what is about passing the budgets the content of the budgets are very important How much of it were allocated to education? How much of it were located to um power How much of it were allocated to um road infrastructure, you know, and How less of that? No, how less were allocated to funding? Um Be the government themselves, you know Um, some of them are very very poor, you know in terms of the numbers if you look at what they are looking for themselves in terms of how Funding their offices, you know very very poor as in they increase this significantly while their education Um, you know get as much, you know Um If we're going to move forward into into the fourth then issues around human resource development Has to be prioritized Issues around that would mean improving the education system. I looked at the budget of Of the universities currently, you know If you if you just oppose that with what the national assembly allocated for itself If you just for if you just oppose that with what the federal government is going to use to run its activities, you know You know that we're not serious yet. And then of course Um, how much attention are we given to power? Power remains a critical issue in our country. In fact, many of us celebrated Christmas without electricity in our homes, you know and just towards the last week of uh Of december we're beginning to hear that electricity tariffs will also be increased You know So if well if the government intends to increase the pressures on the pockets of Of Nigerians the question will be what sacrifices is it willing to make? I was expecting that the president's speech this morning was going to Maybe say something about how much they're going to cut From what they are currently spending on each minister what they're currently spending On the travels that they have made and all of that, but it is not there and then of course Still talking about states I'm looking at what is the government going to do about abuja and lego states You know, these are two states that are very critical to the economy You know, um, you're talking about legos. You're talking about the commercial nurse center Of the economy then you're talking about abuja the power seat You need recently we have seen what's what what has been happening in abuja keeping up paying insecurity at a very high rate Investors are not going to look at that and come into the country No matter how much pledges they make, you know In december we heard from the government that they have uh, um They have accumulated about over about 15 billion dollars in in pledges Plages do not um translates to actual investment They can make pledges to you or if if you don't do the work if you don't put in the The investment within um investors are not going to come in so it's not All of this needs to be balanced in 2024. Um, we have in abuja where You have an fc team minister who is more interested in politics than he's interested in the development of this Of the state. What is the god? What is the president going to do about wiki in 2024? Those are issues that needs to be addressed if you don't address the development of abuja Then every other states will suffer, you know So all of those things is what we're expecting that actual actions are taken um in 2024 to improve The state of the economy at the position where it is It is abysmal and these states needs to need to leave up to expectation really Yeah, but um first of all This budget was raised based on assumptions Because the explanation that was given by the national assembly is that the government owned Enterprises pledged you just talked about pledge. That's what reminded me of this a pledge cannot translate into action But government owned enterprises pledged That they were going to raise their revenue and so they jacked up the the budget Just because of these pledges In the first place are we safe to make a presumptions or a presumptuous budget as it is because all these figures are based on projections that may or may not come to fruition um You are very uh When when we talk about The pledges that the government agencies are making i've thought I would have thought that the government will go back to antithesis And what has happened before um if you look at the performance of the budget over the years a if we budgeted let's let's assume we budgeted hundred naira For a year to earn hundred naira in a year The nigerian government has never made hundred percent of that revenue projection You know that's never been the time when we exceeded or even attained the hundred percent at least for uh for the period of this democracy since since 1999 That we've had you know, um, it has always maybe stopped at uh, if you If you were good enough if the government was very active enough They will make us say about a 70 percent of that of that revenue projection You know never been a time that we attained hundred percent. So Yes, it begs the question. Why are you pleasing? um Increase in the budget on projections of agencies What reforms have those agencies put in place to ensure that the projections that they are making Are attainable I don't think I've seen Significant improvement in the in any of the agencies many of them are still running like the way this old civil service Systems are are being run, you know There's a there's been a lot of talk around automation of governance the e-governance projects that the government has been in or has embarked on for For over eight years now, you know, but that has not been fulfilled So if if you have not been able to integrate Every agency within within an automated system How do you then want to account for the leakages that will result from from continually using manual techniques to earn revenue, you know, so um It is not going to work without technology There's got to be a serious Discussion within government itself breaking everybody every stakeholder um across the agencies to say look we have to get serious and Um, if if we're going to survive it is going to be based on how much investment we make in technology So, um, we hear a lot from the new minister of communication um Innovation and digital economy about how they're going to integrate um The the the whole mdh, you know, and the other agencies and all that but that hasn't started happening yet. Um, We we haven't seen any action there. So I want to see some form of activity around investment in technology You know, let's let's see how that is going to work and see How that will improve our revenue But until we do that, I don't think all these estimates that we keep projecting Are going to work and it's also the same thing when you hear the president say that we're going to pull Pull 10 million people or 20 million people out of poverty question is How do you want to do that? You don't have data. First of all, we don't have we even have a population data Um, in Nigeria yet. Um, the last estimate estimates that we are Um, working with is the 2017 estimate from the mpc. You know, the mpc has not updated for 2018 2019 2020 Up until 2023 So if we don't even have that updated yet, what data is the government going to use to pull 20 million people or 40 million people Out of poverty how do they describe poverty? You know, so those are questions political questions that need to be answered. He said something about um, um, um leveraging data Last year in december as well that the economy is going to ride on or survive um with the use of data but How much is that how much investment are they making? When are we going to have the population sensors? You know our sensors when I'm gonna have maybe so those are questions that need Yeah, there really are very many questions that I even have a personal question. You don't have to answer this but um I'm a business person and I believe that if you're budgeting a lot of money to go in Then you should be looking for ways to get the money out So you should be looking for ways to make sure that your business is thriving and it's profitable, right? So I'm thinking we're talking about these numbers How are we sure that we can actually make that money back? But sadly We cannot continue this conversation right now because we're a little bit out of time But I think we're going to bring you back so we can you know take a deep dive into this conversation But thank you so much for joining us and thank you for bringing your valuable contributions Happy new year friend and happy new year once again Thank you so much All right Okay, we'll be speaking to frank elia here's the technology and business news editor at business day All right, we'll go on a short break and when we return we'll be looking at our next hot topic Well, we're going to be talking about the refinery. So you want to stick around for this one season