President Muhammadu Buhari has approved the opening of five COVID-19 Donor Accounts which form part of the existing TSA arrangement in the following commercial banks: Zenith Bank; Access Bank; Guarantee Trust Bank; UBA; and First Bank.
This is in addition to the main COCAVID Fund Account with the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN.
Meanwhile, the office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF), has issued a framework on how funds donated by private individuals and institutions to mitigate the negative impact of the coronavirus pandemic should be administered.
According to the framework released on Tuesday, disbursements of all COVID 19 Funds including those being collected directly by CBN and those domiciled with commercial banks shall be through appropriation.
The framework stated that the COVID 19 Funds are “to be appropriated directly to participating MDAs and spending units like Ministry of Health, Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Nigerian Centre for Disease Control, etc rather than to an intermediary agency like the Presidential Task Force (PTF).”
In a statement by the OAGF Director of Information, Press and Public Relations, Mr Henshaw Ogubikein Abuja, the administrative cost of the PTF “shall be appropriated separately to the PTF Secretariat.”
“The advantage is that the respective spending units and their Accounting Officers take full responsibility for funds appropriated to them and likely bottlenecks at the PTF are eliminated” the framework stated.
The framework explained that “transparency is enhanced when funds are spread to more MDAs than when a huge amount is put under the control of a single entity.
”To ensure equity and transparency in fund allocation, the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning has also been directed to work with the PTF to determine the needs of participating MDA such as Health, Humanitarian Affairs, NCDC, etc.
Affected MDAS, the framework noted, “shall present details of their needs together with an estimated cost. This will form the basis for the allocation of funds and enable post expenditure reporting and audit.”
Funds are to be transferred to TSA Sub Accounts of spending units based on approved allocations.
The federal government also ordered all Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) that will benefit from the COVID-19 contributions to provide information to the public within seven days on how the money is spent.
According to the framework, any information regarding the management of the COVID-19 fund should be made available “to any member of the public. All participating MDA are to provide information on all COVID-19 Fund transactions to any member of the public – individual or corporate – under the Freedom of Information Act (FOI) within 7 days of receiving the request.”
Failure to publish a timely report of COVID-19 activities in the prescribed format and at the stipulated intervals or to respond to FOI request the government warned: “will constitute early warning signs of mismanagement and shall be deemed as a contravention of this Guideline.”
The framework also ordered that “all collections into the Commercial bank accounts are to be swept into FGN Sub-Recurrent Account with the CBN. Failure to sweep all balances within 24 hours shall be deemed a violation of the Presidential directive on TSA which shall attract sanctions.”
Similarly, the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation shall publish a Daily Treasury Statement for COVID-19 Fund outlining all the inflows into the Fund and all the outflows.
Also, each participating MDA shall publish a Daily Payment Report indicating the Beneficiary, Purpose of the Payment, and the amount for any payment above N5 million made out of the COVID-19 Fund.
These publications shall be made on the Open Treasury Portal (www.opentreasury.gov.ng) not later than one week following the respective transaction. In addition, each MDA shall publish a detailed report of its activities relating to the COVID-19 Fund on its website at the end of every week.
The Monthly Budget Performance Report for the COVID-19 Fund shall be published on the Open Treasury Portal not later than 14 days following the end of the month.
In addition, a comprehensive report of all receipts and payments shall be published on the OAGF Transparency Portal as well as other government websites including those of Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning; Secretary to the Government of the Federation and Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF) not later than two weeks following the end of the pandemic.
For purposes of visibility, the government has instructed that “the inflow information “shall indicate the source of the funds while the outflow information shall indicate the MDA responsible for each payment out of the Fund.”
All accounts with commercial banks are to be linked with the TSA at CBN to provide a single consolidated view of aggregate Government cash balances.
This will provide a single-window for real-time access to details of receipts and payments across all commercial bank accounts. In the absence of a ready tool to accomplish this requirement, the current CBN Payment Gateway may be deployed.
The organized private sector, wealthy individuals, and ordinary citizens have been rising to help the government mitigate the impact of the dreaded Coronavirus pandemic through financial and material donations for the provision of critical medical facilities and equipment as well as palliatives for vulnerable citizens.
