Ikpeazu flags off 2017 Abia budget

UMUAHIA—GOVERNOR Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia State has flagged-off the State’s 2017 Budget Defence and gave the assurance that all leakages in the internally generated revenue would be blocked. According to the Governor, the current economic situation in the country calls for prudent management of government revenue. He said that Abia would succeed if it gives attention to areas where it has comparative advantages. Ikpeazu also expressed the hope that the 2017 budget would have a direct bearing on the policy thrust of his administration even as he noted that trade and commerce would play crucial roles in the 2017 budget. To this end, he announced that there would be systematic rehabilitation of rural markets in the state, promising that the value chain production in the agriculture sector would also receive a boost. The Governor also announced that the 2017 budget proposal would adopt pyramid system of “bottom to up” approach in its input stage to accommodate inputs from ministries, departments and agencies, MDAs in the state. According to him, the approach would make room for sound budget proposals, hence the need for the MDAs to come and defend their various budgets. “Our strategy now is to work from bottom to the top so that every ministry will make an input going forward so that whatever you see now originated from the ministries and that is why they are challenged to come and defend it,” Ikpeazu said. Christening it as “Budget of Prudence and Self-Reliance”, Governor Ikpeazu said “we will work towards it; we may not realize it 100% but we will certainly grade ourselves and say whether we made it 80% or 90%”. He warned those that might work outside, saying “if you do something outside the budget, it is fraudulent and the sanctions are clear. Everybody understands this. We expect that we are going to work to achieve most of the things we have listed for ourselves”.