BY FAVOUR PERCY-IDUBOR, BENIN
THE Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, has signed into law a revised supplementary budget of N450 billion.
Obaseki who signed the revised supplementary budget at the EXCO Chamber, in Government House, Benin City, said the government is appropriating about N5 billion to boost the growth of small businesses in the State.
He said, “I want to express my profound gratitude and appreciation to Mr. Speaker and members of the Edo State House of Assembly (EDHA) for the honour you have done us by promptly and expeditiously approving the revised supplementary budget.
“Also, I thank you for your understanding and appreciation of the issues at stake. Last week, I met with Mr. Speaker and the appropriation committee to inform and intimate them of the need for a revision of the budget they have earlier approved.
“We had to come back to the House to request for a revision and a supplementary allocation of the existing 2024 budget. After proper review and analysis, we found out that the 2023 budget was about N225 billion and at that time the exchange rate was about N750.
“It only follows common sense that if we must grow the economy of Edo State, our budget size needed to be doubled. What we have done in Edo is not just to double the budget size but to ensure more efficiency of the budget.”
Obaseki continued: “What is different about this budget which has been revised is that we are almost certain that we have a 95 percent performance on the budget. As at half year, we are almost at a 100 percent relatively speaking. We don’t see the situation changing at the end of this year.
“What is more important for Edo people that we represent is that with this supplementary provision, most provisions are now going to capital expenditure. Whereas at the last evaluation, the budget ratio was about 55 per cent for capital and 45 per cent for recurrent, this appropriation is now 57 per cent for capital and 43 for recurrent expenditures. You can see that a lot more efficiency and resources are going to our people.
“We also used the opportunity of this revision to address a very important issue raised during the last citizens’ protest in Nigeria. Edo joined Nigerians to voice out their concerns about the deteriorating welfare of citizens.
“As a State, we can’t address all these issues but realized that for many small businesses, because of inflationary pressure, most of their capital has been eroded as they can only trade with 50 percent and earning less.
“With the revised supplementary budget, we attempted to address some of these issues. We are providing in this budget up to N5 billion which we plan to disburse up to N1 billion monthly to help very small businesses, traders, and farmers access capital. We will use market associations, age groups and associations in communities where they already have some sort of support to each other as we try to ameliorate the suffering of Edo people.”
The governor added, “We want to assure you that for the few months left in the life of this administration, our goal is to ensure that we complete all projects started and to leave a solid foundation on which the next administration will build on.”
Earlier, the Speaker of the State Assembly, Rt. Hon. Blessing Agbebaku, alongside other members of the house, presented the 2024 revised supplementary budget to the governor.
