The minister of State for Finance, Dr. Yerima Ngama, said yesterday that oil revenue has dropped by N65 billion as a result of the maintenance work currently going on at the Forcados oil and Qua Iboe terminals.
This is even as the Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) shared the sum of N612 billion to the three tiers of government.
Ngama, gave the disclosure shortly after this month’s FAAC meeting in Abuja, yesterday.
The meeting, which was convened to consider as well as approve the statutory allocations for the month of November, had in attendance commissioners of finance from the 36 states of the federation.
Others in attendance were representatives from the Federal Inland Revenue Service, Nigeria Customs Service, Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission as well as the accountant-general of the federation, Mr. Jonah Otunla.
Addressing journalists shortly after the meeting, the minister put the gross revenue for the month of November at N723.13bn.
This, he noted, was lower than the N788.54bn received in the previous month.
He said, “The gross revenue of N723.19bn received for the month was lower than the N788.54bn received in the previous month by N65.40bn.
“This was due to a drop in production and lifting as a result of maintenance work at Qua Iboe and Forcados terminals.
The distributable statutory revenue according to him was N410.56bn indicating a decrease of N29.91bn or 6.79 per cent when compared to that of October.
The minister said the committee approved the sum of N612.07bn to be distributed as statutory allocations among the three tiers of government.
The amount when compared to the N611.06bn shared in October represented an increase of N1.01bn or 0.16 per cent.
This amount, it was learnt would be credited to the accounts of three tiers of government on Monday to enable them pay the salaries of their workers.
The? sources of the allocation, according to the minister, are from statutory N410.56; Value Added Tax N50.22bn; and augmentation for the month N143.67bn.
He also added that the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation made a refund of N7.61bn as part payment for their indebtedness to the federation account.
This would also be credited to the accounts of the states.
Ngama said there was also an exchange gain of N9.11bn, being the difference between the average prevailing rate and the budgeted rate.