Nigeria will have prudent2 in 2014 – Okonjo-Iweala

The Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, says the country will have a prudent 2014 budget, which will be all inclusive.
Okonjo-Iweala, who is also the Coordinating Minister for the Economy, gave the assurance when he briefed newsmen on the state of nation’s economy in Abuja on Wednesday.
She said: “We are still at the middle of drafting the budget and we don’t want to come to you with some figures and later on, change it.
“But it is true, we will have what I call a very prudent budget because Nigeria is living in a world and global environment, therefore, we have to watch it.
“All of you would have heard about the discovery of gas and oil being made all over the world.
“It was announced that an Austrian company has found oil in acetic.”
Okonjo-Iweala said the country has to prepare itself ahead of the discovery of oil around the world to avoid being caught by surprise.
She said: “Though the price of oil was still on the high side now, but our job is to try and plan ahead.
“This will enable the country take everything in its stride and does not feel any stress.
“That is why we are taking a prudent approach.
“With all these discovery of gas and oil, we have to be cognisant because that is what other countries are doing.
“We should not be too optimistic and then be caught off guard.
“That is why we are going to run what I call a prudent budget.”
The minister said the proceeds would be channelled to ease areas that were causing bottlenecks and stopping the economy from growing.
She said her ministry was working closely with all stakeholder and relevant committees in the National Assembly to ensure a good budget.
On the implementation level of the 2013 budget, she said that N850 billion had been released as at present.
The minister said: “The real facts are: we have released N850 billion now.
“We released N400 billion in the first quarter.
“We released N200 billion in the second quarter and another N250 billion for the third quarter.
“We have cash backed fully what we have released.
“We tried to get away from the practice of releasing without cash backing.”
Okonjo-Iweala said that out of the N250 billion released for the third quarter, only N210 billion had been loaded on the system.
“Out of the N600 billion released from the first and second quarter, Ministries Departments and Agencies have used 76 per cent on the average.
“By the end of the Federation Allocation Accounts Committee meeting, the remaining balance of N40 billion out of the N250 billion would be paid.
“On the general well being of the economy, I can say that it was reasonably doing well.”
The minister said there were indications on the ground showing the state of the economy, adding that jobs had been created through various government programmes.
She said: “In agriculture, over 2.5 million seasonal and full time jobs have been created.
“For example, in rice, 460 000 jobs created were seasonal.
“On manufacturing, an Indorama company would be making an investment of about $1.2 billion in Petro-Chemical, especially in fertiliser.
“Protea and Gamble of the US had invested N250 million in manufacturing of baby products in Ibadan, among others.
“I was sure that the SURE-P and YouWin programmes also created jobs and government will continue to work to ensure economic growth.
“This administration is determined to ensure that lives of ordinary Nigerian are touched.”
President Goodluck Jonathan on Tuesday presented the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper to the Senate.