The Federal Government spent N825 billion in three years on travels, maintenance, local and international training, welfare and stationery/computer consumables.
Disclosing this, yesterday, Head of the Efficiency Unit, set up by the Ministry of Finance to streamline government overhead expenditure, Patience Oniha, said from the study of government overhead expenditure it carried out between 2012 and 2014, 60 per cent of Federal Government’s overhead expenditure were, on the average, incurred through local and international travels, maintenance, local and international training, welfare, office stationery and consumables, honourarium and sitting allowance, meals and refreshment and books.
She said: “In furtherance of its commitment to re-prioritise spending and cut cost on recurrent expenditure, The Efficiency Unit of the Federal Ministry of Finance is planning to introduce detailed price guidelines to ensure value for money in procurement by Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
“To reduce the incidence of cash, the deployment of Ministerial Debit Cards is being piloted.
The unit, which carried out an extensive and detailed review of the Overhead Expenditure data of the government for the period 2012 to 2014, found that the Cumulative Expenditure on these five items was N825 billion, representing 61 per cent of the Cumulative Total Overhead
Expenditure of N1,353 billion.