SURE-P gets N268.37b in 2014 budget – Okogu

Dr. Bright Okogu, the Director-General of Budget Office of the Federation, on Friday said that N268.37 billion had been set aside for the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme in the budget.
Okogu made the statement at a news briefing at which he gave details of the budget, which was also signed by President Goodluck Jonathan on Friday.
He said: “The budget as passed comes to a total figure of N4.695 trillion of expenditure as passed by the National Assembly.
“In addition to this, SURE-P has N268.37 billion set aside specifically to handle issues that have to do with SURE-P.
“If you take the two together, it comes to N4.96 trillion.”
Okogu said that that the recurrent expenditure, consisting of salaries and overhead transfers among others, was N2.455 trillion.
He said that N712 billion was set aside for debt service, while the capital expenditure was N1.119 trillion as against N1.59 trillion in 2013.
Okogu said that N408.69 billion was set aside as statutory transfers to service certain identified government organs.
He said: “Statutory transfers are monies that are sent directly to certain identified organs of government.
“National Assembly is one of them.
“NDDC is another one.
“UBEC, human rights and few other benefits under the window of statutory transfers.”
Okogu said that the budget was passed on oil benchmark of $77.5 and 2.388 million barrel oil production per day, compared to 2.5 million barrel per day in 2013 budget.
Okogu explained that the budget was also passed based on $160 to one naira as was the case in 2013.
“Aggregate revenue projected for the three tiers of government is N10.88 trillion and Federal Government will receive N3.73 trillion as against N4.1 trillion received in 2013,” he said.
The director-general added that fiscal balance with the old Gross Domestic Product came up to two per cent, adding that with the rebasing it would be one per cent.
Commenting on the allocations to the various sectors, he said Education received N495.2billion, adding that there would be other forms of funding for the sector.
The health sector got N264.46 billion; Niger Delta Ministry, N113.6billion; Agriculture and Water resources got N119.32 billion.
He said that Agriculture got N67.04 billion while water resources received N54.27 billion.
Under infrastructure development, he said that the power sector received N101.2 billion; Works, N133.72 billion; and FCT, N30.4 billion.
Okogu said that some of the major sector would also benefit from the SURE-P allocation.