NIGERIA’s Senate President, Godswill Akpabio has claimed that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu grew Lagos state’s monthly Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) from N600 million to N59 billion.
Akpabio made the claim in his welcome address delivered during the presentation of the nation’s 2024 budget by Tinubu on Wednesday, November 29, 2023. He recounted the achievements of Tinubu prior to and after becoming Nigeria’s president.
President Tinubu, had on Wednesday presented a budget of N27.5 trillion for the 2024 fiscal year to the joint session of the National Assembly in Abuja, the nation’s capital. The budget is christened the ‘Budget of Renewed Hope.’
Delivering the welcome address, the Senate President said, “We need to acknowledge the specific achievements of Mr. President, Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration so far. Those who doubted him, initially, forgot his track record as the Governor of Lagos State, Nigeria’s melting pot (sic).
“They forgot his various economic reforms that helped attract investments and promoted economic growth; improved the ease of doing business; promoted pro-business policies; and attracted foreign direct investment, not to mention today’s robust internally generated revenue which he grew as the Governor of Lagos from N600 million to today’s N59 billion. Nigerians believe you are the man for the job of fixing our economy (sic).”
CLAIM
Tinubu grew Lagos state monthly Internally Generated Revenue from N600 million to N59 billion.
THE FINDINGS
Findings by The FactCheckHub show that the claim is FALSE.
The Internally Generated Revenue is the sum total of all revenues accruing to a Nigerian state from its own sources, excluding grants, subventions and other receipts from the federal government.
It’is often obtained from various sources such as Pay As Your Earn (PAYE), transport taxes, personal income taxes and LGAs revenues, among others.
Checks show that Tinubu, had, in 2022 bragged about raising IGR of Lagos from N600 million monthly in 1999 when he assumed the office as the governor of Lagos state to N8 billion when he left the office. That claim has already been debunked here by the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD).
Contrary to Akpabio’s claim, data quoted by BudgiT in its report titled “What we know about Lagos Finances” published in 2018 show that the monthly Internally Generated Revenue of Lagos state was N14.6 billion in 1999, representing a monthly average of N1.2 billion.
This tallies with data cited by a journal published in the Research Academy of Social Sciences which also show that Lagos state recorded an annual IGR of N14.6 billion in 1999.
On the current IGR of Lagos state, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) recently reported that the state generated N651bn (651,145,633,085.30) in 2022 which amounts to N54 billion monthly. This is lower than the N59 billion quoted by Akpabio in his speech.
THE VERDICT
The claim by the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, that Tinubu grew Lagos monthly IGR from N600 million to N59 billion is FALSE; data show that the IGR figures were inaccurate for both years.
Nurudeen Akewushola is a fact-checker with FactCheckHub. He has authored several fact checks which have contributed to the fight against information disorder. You can reach him via [email protected] and @NurudeenAkewus1 via Twitter.
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