Fiscal Responsibility Archives - Centre for Social Justice

Request for Expression of Interest to Prepare a Fiscal Responsibility Index for Federal MDAs

Center for Social Justice — Tue, 17 Mar 2026 09:48:12 +0000

Introduction

Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) with the support of the European Union Rule of Law and Anti-Corruption Project (RoLAC 2) is implementing a program on “Improving the Effectiveness of Anti-Corruption Processes and Reforms in Nigeria”. The goal of the project is to contribute to increased effectiveness of anti-corruption laws, policies, interventions and strategies for the entrenchment of reforms at national and subnational levels. This would lead to increased compliance with anti-corruption laws. Anti-corruption laws and policies are not an end in themselves but they are expected to lead to systemic change, enhanced compliance and behavioural change in society, making it possible for increased prevention of corruption, corrective action in individual cases, detection and prosecution of offenders and to make more difficult, future breaches of the law.

Background

Nigeria has enacted a Fiscal Responsibility Act applicable at the federal level with states enacting similar laws modelled after the federal legislation. The Fiscal Responsibility Index (FRI) seeks to provide objective analysis and review of implementation of fiscal governance laws and policies across Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government with a view to supporting and facilitating capacity building and improvements in fiscal governance. The thrust of the FRI is to strengthen processes and systems and in the long run guarantee that the proposed benefits of budgets and fiscal policies reach majority of Nigeria’s population. Federal MDAs will be benchmarked and nudged to comply with their fiscal responsibility obligations. Competition is engendered in MDAs in a race to the top for reform compliance.

The FRI is a Nigerian Index designed for Nigerian MDAs. It focuses on key areas of policy-based budgeting, budget comprehensiveness and transparency, budget credibility, budget implementation, monitoring and evaluation. It also deals with accounting, reporting and auditing. It is partly a self-assessment exercise that will identify the gaps and facilitate the design of remedial action including capacity building and systemic reforms.

Terms of Reference

CSJ requires a consultant that is knowledgeable in national and international standards, laws and policies on fiscal governance, and related anti-corruption standards. The consultant will carry out desk reviews of Nigeria’s fiscal institutions and standards, and emerging literature and jurisprudence on fiscal governance; prepare, distribute, retrieve and analyse questionnaires from MDAs and stakeholders. It will involve key informant interviews, focused group discussions and a validation meeting. It will also involve the engagement of relevant Committees of the National Assembly. The study will undertake a political economy analysis of fiscal governance, identify and review the different scenarios of action and inaction on fiscal reforms and their implications, do a cost benefit analysis of reforms and end with recommendations for reforms.

Key Deliverables

Produce an FRI that ranks federal MDAs in accordance with their performance on the Index

Timeline

To develop the FRI, the consultant will work with the programme director for twenty-five days on this assignment.

Professional Experience and Qualification

The Consultant must have not less than 10 years’ experience working in fiscal governance and anti-corruption work. The Consultant must be able to show proof that he has conducted similar assignments in the past and or demonstrate skills, competence and capacity to undertake the assignment.

Academic Qualification

A Master’s degree in Economics, Law, Social Sciences or any other discipline related to the task is required. Professional certifications in any related discipline would be an added advantage.

Method of Application

Interested Consultants should send their expression of interest to the following e-mail; csjprocurement@gmail.com alongside their CVs. The EOI should include detailed qualifications (including copies of relevant certificates) and a two-page statement of the Consultants understanding of the assignment and how s\he intends to proceed with the work.

Timeline

EOIs should reach CSJ within seven days from the date of this Request for EOI.

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2026 FEDERAL BUDGET FRIVOLOUS EXPENITURE PULLOUT

Center for Social Justice — Fri, 13 Feb 2026 14:33:24 +0000

RECOMMENDATIONS ON THE LINE ITEMS OF FRIVOLOUS, INAPPROPRIATE, UNCLEAR AND WASTEFUL ESTIMATES IN THE 2026 FEDERALAPPROPRIATION BILL ESTIMATES

2026 FEDERAL BUDGET FRIVOLOUS EXPENITURE PULLOUT (166 downloads )

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CPI April 2025 Review

Center for Social Justice — Fri, 30 May 2025 16:04:54 +0000

April 2025 CPI and Inflation Rate: A Review Eze Onyekpere Esq.

CPI April 2025 Review (818 downloads )

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Request for Expression of Interest to Develop a Fiscal Responsibility Code of Conduct

Center for Social Justice — Fri, 24 Jan 2025 10:57:53 +0000

Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) with the support of the European Union Rule of Law
and Anti-Corruption Project RoLAC 2 is implementing a program on “Improving the
Effectiveness of Anti-Corruption Processes and Reforms in Nigeria”.


	Request for Expression of Interest to Develop a Fiscal Responsibility  Code of Conduct	(461 downloads	)

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2025 Federal Budget NHIS Pull-out

Center for Social Justice — Mon, 13 Jan 2025 21:17:00 +0000

This document is a pullout of items in the 2025 Federal Budget Proposals relevant to the NHIS

2025 Federal Budget NHIS Pull-out (408 downloads )

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2025 FEDERAL BUDGET FRIVOLITIES

Center for Social Justice — Mon, 13 Jan 2025 15:20:17 +0000

The 2025 Budget is here. Nigeria is undergoing very serious economic and fiscal crisis. There is stagflation. Inflation rate is currently at 34.6% while food inflation is at 39.93% due to high prices of staple foods including rice, maize, yam, guinea corn, vegetable oil, etc. Economic growth is tepid at 3.46% while unemployment is at all time high. The exchange rate of the naira to the dollar at the official rate of the Central Bank of Nigeria is over ₦1,500 to $1, while the street value is over ₦1,600 to $1. The monetary policy rate is at all time high of 27.5% while interest rates from financial institutions are in excess of 30%. Over 63% of Nigerians are multi dimensionally poor and majority live below the poverty line while debt service is in excess of 45% of aggregate expenditure. Insecurity is rapidly spreading to different parts of the country, including new terrorists’ groups that were previously not in operation in Nigeria.

In the 2025 executive budget proposals, the aggregate expenditure is ₦49.740 trillion, the expected revenue is ₦36.352tn while the budget deficit is ₦13.387tn. Debt service will gulp ₦16.327tn. With this scenario, the reasonable expectation is that every available resource in the 2025 federal budget proposal should be targeted at concrete deliverables aimed at reducing poverty, creating jobs, improving infrastructure and stimulating economic growth. Indeed, frivolous, inappropriate, unclear and wasteful expenditure should be eliminated from the budget. A large part of the funding for the budget will be borrowed and it will be foolhardy to borrow and waste the borrowed funds. There are so many projects that are vaguely described and without location; a play on words using terms like empowerment and sensitization, etc.

The State House and Presidency vote is suffused with bloated routine maintenance, renovation and repair work, purchase of SUVs and vehicles in the billions of naira. These are not priorities for spending borrowed money. Service Wide Votes continue the tradition of lump sum votes for vaguely described expenditure items, which at the end of the year, cannot guarantee value for money. The vote of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security is suffused with projects that have no locations, class of beneficiaries and sometimes no clear deliverables. This has been the norm in agriculture budgeting over the years. The most troubling part of this proposal is that many of the unclear proposals are to be funded from debt. Borrowing and demonstrating a clear intent to mismanage the resources is economic sabotage of the highest order and should be discontinued. These votes need to be totally repackaged and nebulous expenditure proposals made clear and to be of benefit to Nigerians.

The 12 River Basin Development Authorities sit on thousands of acres of public land and over the years, get allocations for tractors, farm equipment, implements, fish and livestock replenishment, seeds and implements, etc. They should be revenue centres that remit billions of Naira to FGN instead of the current approach where they gulp money without any meaningful contribution to the revenue. The land, machinery and other infrastructure could be capitalized for collaboration with the private sector for commercial farming that will generate revenue for government. At a minimum, RBDAs should be compelled to fund their personnel and recurrent expenditure pending when they are fully weaned of public funding.

There are many new and ongoing projects proposed by the National Rural Electrification Agency without geographic location and class of beneficiaries beyond stating the name of the state or the geopolitical zone. It is imperative for NASS to verify that such projects are actually ongoing or the exact locations of the new ones before approval. The locations should be included in the approved budget. The Agency’s budget proposal is a clear example of how not to present a budget proposal. There seems to be a deliberate attempt to propose interventions in a way and manner that cannot be monitored and project locations will only be known to the Agency.
The meagre resources allocated to the Federal Ministry of Works have been so thinly spread across hundreds of projects to the extent that money will be spent without any concrete improvements in the works sector. In the interim, NASS should prune down the number of projects and focus on a few which can be improved from available resources. Otherwise, voting N100m, N200m to major road projects (even when prudently spent) will amount to a waste of resources. Some roads even got as low as N10m. This is a joke taken too far.
So many MDAs have votes in the 2025 Budget that are not in any way related to their mandate. This should be streamlined and budget approvals should be centred on mandated activities. So many MDAs are asking for money to pay for unverified debts, purportedly from contractor arrears. This should stop and arrears which ideally is part of debts should be centrally handled and verified by the Debt Management Office.

2025 FEDERAL BUDGET FRIVOLITIES (846 downloads )

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REVIEW OF THE 2025 FEDERAL APPROPRIATION BILL AND ESTIMATES

Center for Social Justice — Mon, 13 Jan 2025 15:11:58 +0000

The 2025 Federal Appropriation Bill outlines the Nigerian government’s budgetary priorities for the fiscal year, focusing on economic recovery, infrastructure development, and social investment. The proposed budget reflects an emphasis on addressing macroeconomic challenges, improving service delivery, and fostering sustainable growth.

KEY RECOMMENDATIONS

The following key recommendations flow from this Review for the consideration of the National Assembly (NASS).

The exchange rate should be projected to not more than N1400 to 1USD.

It will be extremely difficult to maintain inflation at the proposed rate of 15%. 25% target is recommended.

Oil production of 9mbpd and a benchmark price of not more than $70 may be more realistic and feasible. Steps at the curtailment of the massive industrial oil theft through inter alia, the completion and activation of the real time online monitoring of all oil and gas assets and facilities.

The expected revenues from company income tax, value added tax, customs collection, education tax, independent revenue, domestic recovery, etc., are realistic and should be approved. However, legislative steps should be taken to block leakages in oil revenue, minerals and mining and electronic money transfer levy.

Enhanced efficiency and introduction of technology by revenue collection agencies should be used to boost FGN’s revenue but it is a capital NO to new taxes (including VAT) under any guise.

Smart policies and legislative interventions should be used to ensure that Nigeria reaps the full benefits from operations of private refineries and recently rehabilitated public refineries to conserve foreign exchange and for Nigeria to be a net exporter of refined petroleum and associated products.

Consider reduction of the fiscal deficit, especially the deficit financed through new borrowing to not more than 60% of the proposed deficit.

Tax expenditure should be capped at not more than 5% of aggregate revenue. It is proposed that the 5% rule should be part of an amended Fiscal Responsibility Act. The Legislature should demand the list of proposed tax expenditures and the justifications as an appendix to the Appropriation Bill and consider and approve same with the budget.

Meticulously scrutinize administrative capital votes and cap same at not more than 10% of the capital vote. The savings should be reprogrammed to developmental capital.

Disperse and re-allocate not less than 70% of Service Wide Votes to the MDAs that have statutory mandates over the projects and issues.

Streamline infrastructure projects in MDAs like Works, Water Resources, Power, etc., to ensure that resources are not so thinly spread. This will guarantee budgetary performance and results as well as value for money.

Ensure that lump sum votes and project tied loans are disaggregated and details made available to Nigerians before approval.

Use legislative interventions to activate the mandatory and compulsory health insurance regime of the National Health Insurance Authority Act and enact a Health Development Bank of Nigeria Act.

Enact a Buy Made in Nigeria Act to facilitate the building of a concentric circle, of a Nigerian economy for Nigerians in Nigeria and in the Diaspora, some form of “Make Nigeria Great Again” Policy. This will guarantee that budgetary expenditure stimulates the Nigerian economy for growth.

Enact a Road Fund and Road Management Authority Act that will raise funds froma plethora of sources for the development of the Roads Sector.

Ensure that the South East, South West, North West and North East Development Commissions have the details of their budgets in the public domain before approval. Secrecy in the programming of these Commissions is the best route to duplicate the waste and lack of value for money associated with earlier Development Commissions.

This Review is a counterpart to CSJ’s pull out of Frivolous, Inappropriate and Wasteful Expenditure and those savings should be channeled to the critical sectors such as Education, Health and Infrastructure especially in Works, Railways and provision of renewable energy.

REVIEW OF THE 2025 FEDERAL APPROPRIATION BILL AND ESTIMATES (1185 downloads )

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FRAMEWORK FOR BUDGET INEQUALITY INDEX (BII) FOR ANALYSING FEDERAL AND STATE GOVERNMENTS’ MINISTRIES, DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES ANNUAL BUDGETS (2014-2016)

Center for Social Justice — Sat, 12 Oct 2024 12:06:41 +0000

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FRAMEWORK FOR BUDGET INEQUALITY INDEX (BII) FOR ANALYSING FEDERAL AND STATE GOVERNMENTS’ MINISTRIES, DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES ANNUAL BUDGETS (2014-2016) (210 downloads )

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Overview of GDP in Quarter Two 2024

Center for Social Justice — Sun, 15 Sep 2024 23:00:15 +0000

Introduction: Overall Quarter Two 2024 Performance

This is a review of the Nigerian Gross Domestic Product (GDP) report produced by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) for the second quarter of 2024. The description of Nigeria’s entire system of production of goods and services shows that the GDP grew by 3.19% (year-on-year) in real terms in the second quarter (Q2) of 2024. This surpassed
the second quarter of 2023 growth rate of 2.51% and the first quarter of 2024 growth of 2.98%. The quarterly GDP figures have been undulating since the beginning of 2023 having recorded 2.31%, 2.51%, 2.54% and 3.46 in the first, second, third and fourth quarters of 2023. The GDP figures are contrasted with a yearly population growth of
about 3%. The nominal GDP for the quarter was N60.93trillion while the real GDP stood atN18.29trillion. The difference according to experts being that the real GDP tracks the total value of goods and services calculating the quantities but using constant prices that are adjusted for inflation. This is opposed to nominal GDP, which does not account for inflation.
The top ten contributing activities to the real GDP in the quarter in percentages were crop production – 20.35; trade – 16.39; telecommunications and information services – 16.36; financial institutions – 6.04; crude petroleum and natural gas – 5.70; real estate – 5.17; food, beverage and tobacco – 4.44; construction – 3.17; professional, scientific and technical services – 3.00; and broadcasting – 2.54. The dominance of crop production in a country where agriculture is still led by small scale farmers, mostly rain fed and lacks necessary mechanization and inputs, points in the direction of an economy where the factors of production have not been optimally harnessed.

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2024 FEDERAL BUDGET FRIVOLITIES

Center for Social Justice — Tue, 19 Dec 2023 09:34:28 +0000

Nigeria is undergoing an economic and fiscal crisis of monumental proportions. The currency has been devalued officially to N750 to 1USD while the street value is above N1000 to 1USD. Inflation is at all time high of 28% year on year while Nigerians living in multi-dimensional poverty is in excess of 130 million. Debt service gulps over 80% of revenue and insecurity rules the land. In the 2024 executive budget proposals, the aggregate expenditure is N27.5trillion and the expected revenue is N18.32trillion, and the deficit is N9.18trillion. Debt service will gulp N8.493trillion. With this scenario, the reasonable expectation is that every available resource in the 2024 federal budget proposal would be targeted at concrete deliverables. Indeed, frivolous, inappropriate, unclear and wasteful
expenditure should be eliminated to the minimum. A large part of the funding of the budget will be borrowed and it will be foolhardy to borrow and waste the borrowed funds. There are so many projects that are vaguely described and without location; a play on words using terms like empowerment and sensitization, etc.
The State House and Presidency vote is suffused with bloated routine maintenance, renovation and repair work, purchase of SUVs and vehicles in the billions of naira. These are not priorities for spending borrowed money. Service wide votes continue the tradition of lump sum votes for vaguely described expenditure items which at the end of the year cannot guarantee value for money. The vote of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security is suffused with projects that have no locations, class of beneficiaries and sometimes no clear deliverables. This is the case in over 90% of the projects. This has been the norm in agriculture budgeting over the years. The most troubling part of this proposal is that many of the unclear proposals are to be funded from debt. Borrowing and demonstrating a clear intent to mismanage the resources is economic sabotage of the highest order and should be discontinued. The vote needs to be totally repackaged and these nebulous expenditure proposals made clear and to be of benefit to Nigerians.
The 12 River Basin Development Authorities sit on thousands of acres of public land and over the years, get allocations for tractors, farm equipment, implements, fish and livestock replenishment, seeds, processing machinery and implements, etc. They should be revenue centres that remit billions of Naira to FGN instead of the current approach where they gulp money without any meaningful contribution to the revenue. The land, machinery and other infrastructure could be capitalized for collaboration with the private sector for commercial farming that will generate revenue for government. At a minimum, RBDAs should be compelled to fund their personnel and recurrent expenditure pending when they are fully weaned of public funding.
There are many new and ongoing projects proposed in the 2024 Federal Budget by the National Rural Electrification Agency without geographic location and class of beneficiaries beyond stating the name of the state or the geopolitical zone. It is imperative for NASS to verify that such project are actually ongoing or the exact locations of the new ones before approval. The locations should be included in the approved budget. The Agency’s 2024 Federal Budget proposal is a clear example of how not to present a budget proposal. There seems to be a deliberate attempt to propose interventions in a way and manner that cannot be monitored and project locations will only be known to the Agency.
The meagre resources allocated to the Federal Ministry of Works have been so thinly spread across hundreds of projects to the extent that money will be spent without any concrete improvements in the works sector. In the interim, NASS should prune down the number of projects and focus on a few which can be improved from available resources. Otherwise, voting N100m, N200m to major road projects (even when prudently spent) will amount to a waste of resources. Some roads even got as low as N10m. This is a joke taken too far. The Federal Roads Authority Bill needs to be enacted to provide other sustainable sources of road financing and management apart from the treasury.

Eze Onyekpere
Lead Director
Centre for Social Justice

2024 FEDERAL BUDGET FRIVOLITIES (524 downloads )

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