The Executive Director, Socio-economic Research and Development Centre, Tijjani Abdulkareem made this known on Tuesday, at the North-West zonal launch of the 2022 States Budget Transparency Index for Nigeria states, held in Kano State.
According to him, the essence of the report is to identify areas, where reforms are needed and how citizens and government can work together through inclusion in ensuring that the government is held accountable for public information.
Following the adoption of CSO’s 2015 recommendations and report, states currently produce a budget citizens report, to enable citizens to understand the budget process.
He said, “The 2022 sub-national Budget Transparency survey is a report that addresses the issues of budget transparency, budget accountability and public access to budget information by the government.
“This report is that every year, the Civil Society Organisations and government collaborate in assessing the level of access to budget information, budget process, Information around the audit process and Information about the public procurement process.
“States have embraced the recommendations and engaged with CSOs in producing citizens’ budgets and today, in the entire North Western states, all the state’s every year produce citizens’ budgets. They share it to the citizens to simplify the budget process, so, it’s all about the commitment and resilience of the CSOs and commitment on the part of the government in ensuring that citizens are more involved in the budget process.
Meanwhile, the Executive Director admitted that the North-West states have actually performed well in the 2023 sub-national budget transparency survey report, adding that Jigawa State has taken the lead for the second time at the National level.
To this extent, he commended the immediate past government of Jigawa State for that leadership in ensuring that the public are included in the budget process and budget information were available online and legislators functions in ensuring that budgets are implemented and citizens are carried along, as well as participate effectively in the budget process.
“We have Kano coming second in the National chart index and they are also performing well but a few years back, we had some states at the back seat but are now progressing, following the adoption of involving the public in budget processes.”
