By Suleiman Umaru
This is not the best of times for Companies and individuals doing business with Ministries, Departments and Agencies, MDAs. This is because of the huge debts which the companies and individuals doing business with the MDAs, had made the agencies to owe the government.
Indeed, barely six months for the Buhari Administration, to elapse, Hajia Zainab Ahmed, minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning who was presented by Victor Omata, Director, Special Projects in the ministry at the south west zonal sensitization Workshop on the FG debt recovery drive through the Project Lighthouse programme on Thursday, December 16, 2022, had revealed that the ministry has ‘‘discovered monumental debs of over N5.2 trillion across 10 MDAs, which many believe was more than the country’ external debt that had been accumulated by the government over the last seven years.
The message was very clear that if the debts has been recovered from the MDAs, the Nigerian government would never have any need to seek for loans from multilateral financial Institutions or the World bank to execute critical projects across the country. This may have informed why Hajia Ahmed and the ministry officials have intensified efforts to recover the debts ahead of the 2023 general elections.
As a prelude to the recovery of the huge debts owed the government by the 10 agencies, the minister who may be acting on the mandate of President Muhammadu Buhari was said to have directed all the government Enterprises ‘‘to henceforth update their list of debtors on a monthly basis against the Project Lighthouse’’ debt recovery portfolio.
According to her the ‘‘ project lighthouse ‘’ is a data driven artificial intelligence engine that provides the ministry with an intelligence and profiling platform ‘‘to aid in policy formulation , implementation and assessing the impacts of those policies on its MDAs to develop a more efficient revenue assessment methodology by ensuring that major revenue loopholes are blocked, and to ensure that their revenue generation is dramatically improved by identifying new revenue opportunities and optimize existing revenue sources , particular, non –oil revenue as well as improve fiscal transparency’’.
Note that the debt recovery drive initiated by the ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, the minister had said had resulted in the recovery of about N3.5 trn in the last the last 12 to 18 months , through the Government Integrated Financial Management Information System, FMIS, as a’ ‘recovery touch point’’.
She had told those that cares to listen that a perfunctory review of the MDAs debt profile which it had perceived shows a’ ‘significant financial loopholes’’ which had had encouraged her ‘‘ to issue a directive on September 26, 2019, to all the government agencies in a bid ‘‘to integrate all government debts across all MDAs with a view ‘ ‘ to having a single window on debt profile of government.’’ She had her way.
She noted that sequel to the issuance of the Finance circular, the ministry through the consolidation efforts of the debt recovery drive has been able to integrate the MDAs N5.2 trn owed the government into one single window platform , noting that the debt aggregation is still on going.
There are indications that N42 billion has been recovered through the project lighthouse programme from the government agencies in the recent time. Given the additional measures that was said to have been put in place by the ministry in the debts recovery drive, financial analysts are of the view that more recovery of the outstanding debts from the one percent unpaid stamp duty would still be made from the MDAs before the expiration of the present Buhari Administration on May 29, 2023.
This may be possible, according to an insider because the ministry has leveraged on the integrated data technology to help block areas of revenue leakages in the government agencies.
