Ambode signs N662.58bn budget into law

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Kazeem Ugbodaga
Governor Akinwunmi Ambode of Lagos State
Lagos State Governor, Akinwunmi Ambode today signed the 2016 budget of N662.588 billion into law.
The governor, who signed the bill into law at the State House, Ikeja, Lagos, Southwest Nigeria on Monday, said the budget would enable government focus on present challenges of security, traffic gridlock, empowerment, among others.
He said the budget has a total revenue of N542.873 billion with the balance of N119.715 billion to be funded through borrowing.
Ambode thanked the State House of Assembly for quick passage of the budget.
He said considering the present challenge of the country, the budget would be financed mostly through Internally Generated Revenue.
Ambode appealed to Lagosians to pay their tax appropriately as government would use the fund to provide their essential needs, saying that government would leave nothing to chance at ensuring that the dividend of democracy is delivered.
However, the Recurrent Expenditure stood at N278,909 billion while Capital Expenditure stood at N383,678bn.
The governor, had while presenting the budget to the State House of Assembly in December 2015 said the total revenue estimate for 2016 fiscal year stood at N542.873Billion, saying the balance of N119.714billion would be funded through deficit financing constituting 0.41 percent of the state GDP based on 2016 budget alone and a cumulative debt to GDP ratio of about 3 percent.
On the size of the budget, the Governor earmarked N120.508 billion for General Public Services representing 18.19 per cent, N28,559,021,841 to Public Order and Safety, representing 4.31 per cent, while Economic Affairs received a lion share of N211,043,408,183 representing 31.85 per cent.
In other sectors, Environment got 8.1 percent of the budget totaling N53,043,599,505; Housing and Community Amenities, got N62,713,091,867 representing 9.46 percent; Health got N64,677,679,096 representing 9.76 per cent; while Recreation, Culture and Religion got N4,636,917,054 which is 0.70 percent of the budget.
Education sector also …Read More

Source:: PM Newspaper