OTP: BudgIT reports 94 percent drop in payments made to personal accounts

BudgIT, a Civic Organization that applies technology to intersect citizens’ engagement with institutional improvement to falicilate societal change, has reported 94% reduction on payments made to personal accounts on the Open Treasury Portal, OPT from from N5.8bn to N308m.

Fresh Angle Interantional can report that in a statement released this morning, Monday February 22, BudgIT and Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre, CISLAC, commended the Federal Government for the reduction, saying payments without description have also reduced by 50.9% from N794m to N389m. 

The statement obtained from the Twitter Handle of BudgIT, noted: “Likewise, payments to personal accounts, which amounted to N2, 962, 536, 395.77 with 190 Occurrences in August 2020, rose by 98.40% to N5, 877, 687, 578.87, with 336 occurrences in December 2020”, adding: “However, these payments have reduced by 94.75% from December 2020 to N308, 174, 806.84, with 15 occurrences in January 2021”.

The Civic Organization explained: “In October 2020, a list of 44 transactions from 16 MDAs was handed over to the ICPC_PE representative for further investigation for non-compliance.

“However, despite ICPC_PE's intervention, we observed some consistent trends emerging from MNDA and FMHDSD with both having the largest share of defaulters in the last quarter of 2020.”

Whilst speaking about the report, BudgITng's Principal Lead, Gabriel Okeowo, reiterated the importance of unveiling those sanctioned to the public, saying: “This will serve as a deterrent to other civil servants and public office holders to be more accountable in the use of public funds.”

He further noted that while the platform is innovative and commendable, much work is still needed to achieve its goal of enabling public transparency and accountability.

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