By AKANIMO SAMPSON

In spite of his war chest of N800 billion, Governor Siminalayi Fubara of Rivers State has tactically offered an olive branch to his political antagonists, saying his administration is not at war with anybody. He has also declared that he is preoccupied with taking care of the needs of Rivers people and protecting the interest of the state.

But, some political demigods, including the Federal Capital Territory Minister, Nyesom Wike, do not appear to be on the same page with the governor. They are alleged to be fighting to derail his administration, and deepening the worrisome ethnic divide in the state.

Fubara however made his declaration while flagging off the 20,000 housing units for low-income earners in the state, along the Obiri -Ikwerre- International Airport Road over the weekend.

According to him, in protecting the interest of Rivers, his administration will continue to do what is right before God and men while also encouraging a robust participation of the people in governance.

“For our people, I want to assure you, our government has nothing to do with fighting anybody. Our governance is to take care of and defend our people. I can assure you here, that this is the beginning of our service to the people of Rivers.

“It is not service to the elites, but to the poor and low-income earners. Those are the people we want to stand with and we are standing with them”, Fubara said, noting that his administration has started a new history with the 20,000 units of housing by giving new hope to Rivers people, particularly the poor.

He assured that in a few months, the first phase of the project will be completed and the housing units allocated to the low-income earners through a transparent process.

“I want to also say it here, let it also be my commitment that this facility, once it commences and gets to the stage of allotment, will go to the rightful people and not one big man to allocate to his family. It will be transparent so that the targeted people will access and benefit from it."

Continuing, he said his administration has started reaping from its open door policy because opportunities like economic empowerment, access to housing and other benefits are now in the offing for the people.

“First of all, we need to give our people hope and today, I believe that everybody in our dear state has seen that light. How did we come about this magic? We opened our doors for negotiation and opportunities, knowing that the government cannot do it alone. We had to invite people that are ready to invest in our state.

“I make bold to say it, Rivers is a safe haven for investment. What we are doing today is to let the world know it, and not what you hear in the media. I tell you that Rivers is safe and secure for anybody anywhere to come and invest. Your investment is safe in our hands."

Acting Administrator of New City Development Authority, Aaron Obelley, in his remarks said the 20,000 units of housing will sit on 1000 hectares of land, pointing out that the first phase, now started, on 100 hectares of land, Obelley stated will provide affordable houses in a striving and inclusive community for the people to live in.

TAF Africa Global that is handling the housing project, explains that the project is the largest housing initiative on a public-private partnership in Africa and the state government will not incur any financial cost in accomplishing the project.

The company assured that it will be diligent in speeding up work to deliver it in good time, while also creating economic opportunities for the people.
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In the meantime, Fubara has assured, “our spirit is high; our determination is forever strong as we remain focused on delivering on our mandate in an honest, accountable, just, and fair manner to all parts of the state and all segments of society.

“Under our watch, no part of the state will be neglected in our development agenda; no one will be left behind in the distribution of resources and opportunities. We reaffirm our commitment to working closely with the state House of Assembly to fulfill all our promises and take Rivers to greater heights of peace, progress, and prosperity.

“We launched the construction of the Port Harcourt Dual Carriage Ring Road as a flagship project to accelerate the socio-economic development of our state. Julius Berger has since mobilized to the site and work on this multi-billion-naira project has begun.

“In line with our consolidation mantra, we have in the last six months completed many of the uncompleted projects we inherited from the immediate past administration, including roads, hospitals, and schools, while those not yet completed, have reached advanced stages of completion.

“Some of the completed roads include Oyigbo – Okoloma Road, Alode – Onne Road, Botem-Gbene-Ue-Hiro Road, Mgbodahia internal roads, Ogbo-Uhugbogo-Udiemude Road, Omoku-Aligwu-Krigene road, Eneka internal roads, Ogbakiri internal roads, and Omagwa internal roads.

“Other roads, which construction is proceeding very well include Ahoada-Omoku dualization, Emohua-Tema junction dualization, Umuakali – Eberi road, Alode-Ebubu-Eteo junction road, Egbu-Ehuda internal roads, Elelenwo internal roads, Rumuepirikom internal roads, phase 2, Bori city internal roads, the Ngo section of the Ogoni-Andoni-Opobo unity road, and the Opobo ring road and electrification projects.

“On education, we have delivered Government Comprehensive Secondary School, Borokiri, Government Secondary School, Eneka, Government Secondary School, Emohua, Government Government Secondary School, Okehi, Comprehensive Secondary School, Alesa – Eleme, Government Secondary School, Ataba, and the 10,000 capacity University of Port Harcourt Auditorium. The hostel and auditorium projects at the Yenagoa campus of the Nigerian Law School are also almost completed.

“Our commitment to healthcare delivery remains strong. Already, we have delivered the Professor Kelson Harrison Hospital, the Dental, Maxillofacial, Ear Nose Throat and Ophthalmology Hospital, and several primary healthcare centres across the state.

“To accelerate the delivery of affordable housing, we have signed a Memorandum of Understanding with TAF Global Africa and turned the sod for the phased development of 20,000 units of houses in the state.

“This is another signature project of our administration, which is targeted at creating new model cities within Obio/Akpor and Ikwerre Local Government Areas of the state with enormous socio-economic benefits to the State and our people.

“On sports development, we have opened the Real Madrid Football Academy for full academic and football training activities with the admission of the first batch of students. We have also rehabilitated the indoor basket hall and pitch at Niger Street, Port Harcourt.

“We are poised to stimulate industrialisation by creating an enabling business environment to attract investors to invest in the different sectors of the state’s economy. To this end, plans are underway to organise the first Rivers Investment Summit in decades to work out an investment and industrialisation road map for the state.

“We have also approved three bills: the Rivers State Investment Promotion Agency Bill, the Rivers State Youth Entrepreneurship Development Trust Fund Bill, the Rivers State Electricity Bill, and the Rivers State New Towns Development Bill, which are critical to accelerating investments, job creation, energy security, economic empowerment, and the socio-economic advancement of the state when passed into law.

“We have concluded arrangements to launch the N4,000,000,000.00 seed fund in partnership with the Bank of Industry to support small and medium-scale enterprises across the state at a single-digit interest rate. ​We have also entered into a memorandum of understanding with an investor to build a modern spare parts market in the state.

“We appreciate the relevance and importance of the civil service to the development of the state through effective implementation of government policies and programmes.

Consequently, our commitment is to strengthen and motivate the civil service for optimal and responsible performance through regular promotions, payment of salaries, pensions and gratuities, and the provision of a good working environment.”

On payment of salaries and pensions to civil servants, Fubara says his administration is up to date on that, and has concluded the promotion exercise for the mainstream civil servants and other staff, except those without functional governing boards, such as the secondary school teachers and health to legally conduct the exercise, will be done as soon as we constitute the governing boards.

According to him, “we have restored water and installed new lifts at the state’s secretariat complex to improve sanitation and ease access to the higher floors of the complex. Since we came on board, we have spent over 6 billion naira to pay the gratuities backlog to retired civil servants. Again, our commitment is to ensure that we clear all areas of gratuities owed to civils by previous administrations.

“​Also, the recruitment exercise of 10,000 workers into the State’s civil service is almost completed and successful candidates will receive their engagement letters as soon as the report from the state’s Civil Service Commission is ratified by the State Executive Council.

“We have worked with security agencies, local governments, and community leaders to keep our state peaceful, safe, and secure. This is an achievement we will continue to further improve and sustain throughout the yuletide and beyond.”

Adding, the governor said, “nevertheless, we can assure our people that the tempo of governance and delivery of services in our priority areas of investments and economic growth, infrastructure delivery and job creation, education, healthcare and human capital development, agriculture, and food security will gain traction and accelerate with speed and vigour in the new year.”

PERFORMANCE of 2023 BUDGET

A total revenue of N755,666,987.238 was projected for the 2023 fiscal year. This sum, according to Fubara, included a supplementary estimate of N200,000,000,000.00, which was accessed for the Exclusive purpose of funding the construction of the Port Harcourt Ring Road project.

The breakdown of the 2023 budget was as follows: Recurrent Expenditure:​, N175,249,692,201.00; Capital Expenditure, ​​​​N380,417,395,037.00; Supplementary capital estimates:, N200,000,000,000.00, totaling ​​​​​​N755,666,987.238.00.

“​As of last October, the total actual receipts from all sources, was approximately 66% performance on the revenue side. There were encouraging improvements in internally generated revenue receipts as against the projections for the year, while the performance of recurrent expenditure was 100%”, the governor said.

2024 BUDGET SIZE

Fubara's 2024 budget, christened “Budget of Promise” is based on the following assumptions: Oil price benchmark of $70 per barrel; oil production rate of 1.5 million barrels per day; and exchange rate of N750 to one dollar as projected by Abuja.

The total projected revenue for state, which has already received legislative approval, is N800, 392,485,433.01. It is constituted as follows: Recurrent Expenditure N361,598,242,570.85​, and Capital Expenditure​​ N410,266,485,090.64, totaling N800,392,485,433.01.

The financial sources of the Fubara 2024 warchest are
Internally generated revenue​​ N231,057,836,945.00, statutory allocation N68, 458,610.00, mineral funds N145, 526,581,463.00, Value Added Tax N55, 650,000,000.00, Refunds Escrow, Paris/ECA N1, 200,000,000.00, and refunds from bank charges N1, 500,000,000.00.

Others are Excess Crude Account N1, 700,000,000.00, exchange rate gain N1, 200,000,000.00, Forex equalisation N3, 000,000,000.00, other FAAC N5, 000,000,000.00, asset sales N20, 000,000,000.00, capital receipts N9, 879,557,210.00, proposed internal/external grants N24, 570,000,000.00, international credits N2, 000,000,000.00, bonds N237, 000,000,000.00, internal loans N235, 000,000,000.00, and prior year balance N6, 934,784,872.01, all totalling N800, 392,485,433.01

RECURRENT EXPENDITURE

Rivers' recurrent expenditure is projected to be spent on personnel emolument N99, 588,939,939.39, new recruitments N28, 924,562,980.61, overhead costs N18, 871,623,339.00, grants,contributions & subsidies N7,908,000,000.00, counterpart pension scheme N15,000,000,000.00, gratuities/death benefits N77,850,000,000.00, and monthly pensions N30,240,000,000.00

Domestic loans interest is projected to gulp N32,420,734,367.60, foreign loan interest N536,709,798.04, domestic loan, principal repayment-N26,018,966,086.7, foreign loan, principal repayment N5,081,731,374.51, FAAC deductions N12,865,723,913.00, and COT/Charges/General Admin N5,000,000,000.00

​The capital allocation of N410,266,485,090.64 represents about 51 per cent of the total budget projections for the fiscal year 2024.

SECTORAL ALLOCATION OF THE CAPITAL BUDGET

The sectoral allocation of the capital budget goes thus:
Governance N161,742,835,256.27, Information & Communication N2,234,273,168.00, Public Administration N13,852,493,641.59, Finance and Planning N7,779,818,293.13, Agriculture N20,311,574,254.53, Infrastructure N128,003,540,952.66, Commerce and Investment N1,787,418,534,40, Culture and Tourism N1,381,187..049.31, Education N40,426,441,994.74, Health N30,555.506,748.20, Social Development N10,155,787,127.27, Environment & Sustainable Development N8,449,614,889.89, Judiciary N5,646,617,642.76

“The overall policy objectives of the 2024 budget are to promote economic development in the state through inclusive growth, the provision of critical infrastructure to support economic, business, and social activities, and the creation of an enabling environment for private sector-led industrialisation, job creation and poverty reduction.

“We will strive to address the challenges of socio-economic inequalities by ensuring improved access to quality and affordable education, healthcare, water, electricity, housing, social investments, gender empowerment and social inclusion. This accounts for the reasonably high allocations in the 2024 capital budget to infrastructure, education, healthcare, social development, environment, sustainable development and agriculture.

“With these funds, we will build more road networks to interconnect the state, rehabilitate, equip, train and staff all dilapidated primary and secondary schools, build technical and vocational education centres, and allocate more funds to our tertiary schools to improve the quality of teaching, learning and research.

“We will also rehabilitate, equip and staff dilapidated primary healthcare facilities, restore, equip, and staff all our general hospitals, complete, equip and staff all five zonal hospitals, implement socially beneficial healthcare schemes, and introduce social investment schemes to fight poverty, social exclusion, and gender discrimination.

“Given the importance of the judiciary in the advancement of the rule of law, economic growth, and social accountability, we have also improved the allocation for the funding of the judiciary, law, and justice sectors in this budget to achieve effective and speedy dispensation of justice in the state.

“We will ensure that accessed local and international credits are used only for capital projects that would benefit economic growth, give attention to the completion of ongoing projects before embarking on new ones, and grow the economy through targeted investments in areas of comparative economic advantage, including commercial agriculture, electricity generation, renewable energy, oil and gas, housing, and sports development.

“We will also provide our young people with the skills and tools they need to succeed in the 21st-century economy and to ensure that education and healthcare are accessible to all regardless of background and means.

“The budget we have put forward reflects our commitment to responsible financial management and our dedication to the progress of our state and the well-being of our people.

Our priorities are clear: to secure our State, foster sustainable economic growth, create opportunities for all, invest in the future, and ensure our collective prosperity.

“As we all know, the security and well-being of the people are the reason we are in government. The budgeting process is fundamental to the realization of this fundamental objective of state policy. We recognise the challenges we face as a State and the pointless efforts to frustrate and sabotage our government even before we get started. As you know desperate situations call for desperate measures. I assure you of our determination to weather the raging storm strategically and responsibly”, Fubara said.

credit: TheSouthernExaminer.com