President Muhammadu Buhari has directed the
ministry of finance, led by Zainab Ahmed, to sell all
recovered and liability-free assets in six months.
A number of politicians and former government
officials will be affected by this because some
assets have been seized in the course of the war
against corruption embarked on by the Buhari
administration.
Speaking on Tuesday while briefing the house of
representatives joint committee on finance,
appropriation, planning and economic development,
Udoma Udo Udoma, the minister of budget and
national planning, said the federal government is
determined to improve its revenue generation in
2019.
“The Ministry of Finance, working with all the
relevant authorities, has been authorized to take
action to liquidate all recovered, unencumbered
assets within six months,” he said.
“The Department of Petroleum Resources has been
directed to, within three months, complete the
collection of past-due oil license and royalty
charges, including those due from Nigerian
Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) (a
subsidiary of NNPC), which it had agreed to pay
since 2017.”
Udoma told the lawmakers that the president has
directed that work should be concluded on the
deployment of the National Trade Window to
enhance customs collections efficiency from the
current 64% to up to 90% over the next few years.
He attributed the government’s inability to meet its
revenue target in 2018 to the non-implementation of
some one-off items.
According to Udoma, these items include the N710
billion from Oil Joint Venture Asset restructuring and
N320 billion from the revision of the Oil Production
Sharing Contract legislation/terms, which have now
been rolled over to 2019.
Speaking on the production quota agreed on by the
Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, the
minister explained that there is no quota set for
condensates.
“Mr. President has directed the NNPC to take all
possible measures to achieve the targeted oil
production of 2.3 million barrels per day.”
He explained that in allocating funds in the 2019
budget proposals, priority was given to critical
infrastructure projects.