The Governor of Oyo State, Seyi Makinde, on Wednesday, presented a budget proposal of Two Hundred and Ninety-Four Billion, Five Hundred and Sixteen Million, Four Hundred and Forty-Five Thousand, One Hundred and Seven Naira (N294,516,445,107.00) for the 2022 Fiscal year to the State House of Assembly.

The 2022 budget was presented to the lawmakers for scrutiny by the Governor, who tagged the proposal budget as “Budget of Growth and Opportunities”. Makinde noted that the focus of his administration is to move the State forward from poverty to prosperity.

The Governor used the opportunity to give an account of stewardship in accordance with his campaign promises and the 2021 budget performances.

On opportunities, he said, “As we continue to create an enabling environment for the private sector to thrive and open our doors to both local and foreign investors in agribusiness, tourism and other sectors. We are also exploring new areas of comparative advantage and encouraging investments in them. As we always say, our doors are open, come and talk with us. In the next few weeks, we will be welcoming the world to Ibadan as we host the Oyo Agribusiness Summit 2021 on 25th October to 27th October. This is a collaboration between the Oyo State Agribusiness Development Agency (OYSADA) and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA).”

He focused the budget on Growth and Opportunities.

Makinde in his speech said, “we have maintained a lower recurrent expenditure to capital expenditure ratio. For the 2022 fiscal year, our recurrent expenditure is One Hundred and Thirty-Eight Billion, Five Hundred and Sixteen Million, Three Hundred and Eight Thousand, One Hundred and Thirty-Six Naira (N138,516,308,136.00). This represents 47.3% of our total budget. As with the 2021 budget we used the tenets of the Federation’s Fiscal Sustainability Plan (FSP) and other development aspirations as a guide.The Oyo State Budget performance stood at 60%. We still have our sights on raising this to 75% before year-end.”

On the revenue side, the state’s actual aggregate revenue was N78.2 billion. The sum of N16.2 billion representing 31.49% was realized as the Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) while Statutory Allocation from the Federation Account Allocation Committee was N17.13 billion representing 62.29%.

He mentioned,” For the 2022 fiscal year, we are projecting and Internally Generated Revenue of N79,796,513,040.00 (Seventy-Nine Billion, Seven Hundred and Ninety-Six Million, Five Hundred and Thirteen Thousand, and Forty Naira). This is a tall order, but we intend to accomplish this without increasing taxes. As in the previous years, we will continue to expand our tax base to include more in the informal sector. We already see this working to our advantage as the recently released figures shows that our contributions to Nigeria’s Value Added Tax shot up to over N64 Billion.

For the 2022 Budget proposal, our budgetary allocation to the Education sector at Fifty-Four Billion, Two Hundred and Sixteen Million, Two Hundred and Twenty-Seven Thousand, and Sixty-Nine Naira (N54,216,227,069.00) represents 20.87% of the total budget. As can be noted, we have continued our tradition of keeping the education allocation above UNESCO standards.

The highest allocation of Seventy-Five Billion, Six Hundred and Twenty-Six Million, Four Hundred and Sixty-Four Thousand, Two Hundred and Seventeen Naira (N75,626,464,217.00) goes to Infrastructure. This is 29.11% of the total budget. We will continue to reduce the infrastructural deficit in Oyo State.

Our total proposed Healthcare budget is Fifteen Billion, Five Hundred and Eight Five Million, Seven Hundred and Forty-One Thousand, Seven Hundred and Ninety-Two Naira (N15,585,741,792.00) that is or 5.23% of the budget.

Finally, we continue to use agribusiness as one of the main drivers of the Oyo State Economy. To this end, we propose an allocation of Eleven Billion, Seven Hundred and Ninety-Eight Million, Six Hundred and Nineteen Thousand, Seven Hundred and Thirty-Seven Naira (N11,798,619,737.00) which is 4.54 % of the budget to this sector.”

While reacting to the Governor’s above speech, the Speaker of the house, Hon. Adebo Ogundoyin said with the early budget presentation, the house is surely going to have enough time to scrutinize and consider it, adding that it will help Oyo State keep to the January to December budget circle.