The Federal Government will in coming weeks distribute the final tranche of the $1.5 billion World Bank-assisted States Fiscal Transparency, Accountability, and Sustainability (SFTAS) Programme for Results to state governments.
This was announced by the Minister of Finance, Budget, and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, at a celebration of the SFTAS Program’s successes.
The event was attended by the World Bank Country Director Shubham Chaudhuri, Governors of Ekiti, Edo, Jigawa, Sokoto, and Ebonyi among others.
The World Bank authorised the four-year SFTAS Programme in June 2018, and it started in May 2019 to help states adopt fiscal transparency, accountability, and sustainability.
The original $750 million loan from the World Bank was divided into two parts: performance-based grants from the federal government to states for meeting the annual eligibility requirements, and the program results, or disbursement linked indicators.
SFTAS is intended to offer performance-based funds and technical assistance to states so they may implement the 22-point Fiscal Sustainability Plan and the Open Government Partnership. Its goal is to encourage states to dramatically improve outcomes in four key results.
States are expected to achieve considerable improvements in four important areas: fiscal transparency and accountability; strengthening domestic revenue mobilization; raising the effectiveness of public spending; and strengthening debt sustainability.
Out of the $1.5bn released by the World Bank in two tranches of $750m each, the sum of N351.65bn had been disbursed to states that met the Disbursement Linked Indicators (DLIs).
The Finance Minister said that since inception, the SFTAS programme has enjoyed a high level of political visibility, adding that the initiative has continued steadily with strong performance and demonstrable high level of ownership by States and Non-state Actors.
