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The balance in the
Excess Crude Oil Account surged to about N450billion at the end of last
month, the accountant general of the federation, Ibrahim Dankwambo,
said at the end of the monthly Federation Accounts Allocation Committee
meeting in Abuja at the weekend. He said the balance of revenue in the
dollar-denominated component of the ECA was about $1.9billion, while
about N50billion was transferred into the domestic ECA. This excludes
the $1billion already deposited by the federal government as seed money
for the take-off of the newly created Sovereign Wealth Fund (SWF).

Mr. Dankwambo
attributed the surge in the revenue in the ECA to increased oil
production capacity under the various Production Sharing Contracts
(PSCs) in recent times as a result of the declining tension in the
Niger Delta as a consequence of the impact of the federal government
amnesty initiative in the region, improved oil prices at the
international oil market above the $60 per barrel benchmark in the 2010
budget as well as a rise in the modified carry agreement receipts by
the oil companies.

“The production
capacity of the multinational oil operators improved tremendously in
recent times as a result of the improved operational environment as a
direct consequence of the Federal Government Amnesty Programme for
Niger Delta militant groups as well as increase in crude oil prices at
the international market. Revenue, generally, was good, that was why
there was a transfer to excess crude account (dollar), which has a
balance of $1.9billion, (domestic) N50billion) and Sovereign Wealth
Fund of $1billion, bringing it to close to $3billion in revenue
savings. Our hope is that this level will be sustained,” he said.

More money to share

The AGF said gross
revenue available for distribution among the three tiers of government
for the month of November was N557.839billion, made up of
N407.554billion as statutory revenue, including Value Added tax (VAT).
The total figure is higher than N451.074billion from the previous month
by N106.766billion. The distributable statutory revenue for the month
was N364.639billion, an increase of N564million, or 0.15 percent
compared to the October figure. There was no augmentation revenue for
the month, neither was there an exchange gain,

considering that
the prevailing exchange rate of N147 per dollar was lower than the N150
per dollar set as the benchmark. A total of about N143.043billion was
transferred to the ECA, as well as for Petroleum Profit Tax (PPT) and
Royalty.