Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL) on behalf of the Civil Society Coalition Against Corruption has called on President Bola Tinubu to give assent to the Bill for an act to amend the Revenue Mobilisation, Allocation and Fiscal Commission Act, CAP. R7 LFN 2010.
The bill when assented to will grant the commission enforcement powers in the monitoring of accruals to and disbursement of revenue from the Federation Account and bring the Act in conformity with the provisions of the 1999 Constitution (as Amended); and for other matters related therewith.
The coalition which made the appeal in a statement issued to media houses at the weekend, and signed by Comrade Debo Adeniran, recalled that the 9th Assembly at the twilight of the last administration had graciously and expeditiously passed the Bill that will give the commission a new lease of life which is awaiting President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s assent.
According to the statement, the Bill as passed by the National Assembly prescribes that the commission shall be wholly funded by the three tiers of government being beneficiaries of the Federation Account.
The statement laments that as one of the 14 executive bodies recognised by the constitution, RMAFC is one of the most poorly-funded agencies compared to other sister constitutional bodies like Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), National Population Commission (NPC), National Assembly (NASS) and others that are heavily funded from the national purse.
The statement reads, “The Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) is one of the executive bodies established by the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).
Amongst its fundamental powers and functions are; to monitor the accruals of federally-generated revenues to the Federation Account and disburse same to the three tiers of government; principles in operation to ensure conformity with changing realities, determine remuneration packages appropriate for political, public and judicial office holders as well as advise governments at all levels on ways to improve their internally-generated revenues.”
They opined that, the important role the commission plays in the nation’s political economy through statutory allocation of revenue via an equitable revenue sharing formula to the three tiers of government and fixing remuneration for public, political and judicial office holders at all levels of government has enormously contributed to the democratisation process, thus encouraging good governance, transparency and accountability and even development in the country.
They said, “The review process of the above exercises involves extensive and in-depth research and studies in various areas of our political economy, call for memoranda, consultations, sensitisation workshops, collection and collation of data, studies of other similar federations in respect of fiscal arrangements, public hearings and administration of questionnaires which involves huge expenditure. These exercises normally take the commission to all the 36 states of the federation and the FCT, as well as the 774 local councils across the country to sensitise Nigerians to make input into the review process.”
It added that in the area of reducing revenue leakages and enhancing revenue generation, the commission has succeeded in expanding the sources of revenue to the Federation Account through the recoveries of hundreds of billions in the recent past.
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