Group photograph of participants at the ongoing 2 day training of CSOs and youth groups in Sokoto on Economic Literacy and Budget Accountability for Governance (ELBAG) in Sokoto.
BY ANKELI EMMANUEL, Sokoto –
Save the Child Initiative, (STCI) Nigeria in collaboration with Plan International with support funding from EU-INTPA project has commenced a 2-day workshop for for Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and youths in Sokoto State on economic literacy and budget accountability for governance.
Speaking in his welcome address, SCTI Head of Mobility, Child Protection Protection, Rabiu Bello Gandi admonished participants to pay attention to the presentations, noting that the issue of economy and budget affects all irrespective of age, class, sex and region.
Rabiu, who noted that proper planning is key to successful living, stressed that “the choices we make in life can make or mar us, hence the need to understand budgeting in all ramifications”.
According to him, for any economy to thrive, there is the need for proper planning, monitoring and evaluation to ascertain level of achievement and challenges encountered.
Giving the training objectives, Matthew Animasahun, the education officer of STCI, Nigeria noted that, that the Plan International EU-INTPA project on “Strengthening Civil Society to Enhance Education for All In Northern Nigeria”, is being implemented in both Sokoto and Adamawa States.
According to Matthew, the project has 3 expected outcomes, which is to strengthen capacity of CSOs and youth to engage with relevant stakeholders on enhanced reformative Tsangaya education, in addition to a gender responsive and inclusive education planning between CSOs, relevant stakeholders as well as to improve the capacity of local civil society partners to promote inclusive strategic education policy dialogue.
On his part, Muhammed Mainasara, who made presentation on “Introduction to Budget and Budgeting” noted that budget can only achieve its targets their must be need for collaboration.
He said budget is a complex process and therefore needs time, accuracy, coordination and continuous planning to attain the desired goals.
Also speaking on “Public Budgeting Process and Implementation”, Mr. Mainasara listed preliminary steps leading to any budget to include, macro economic analysis, government policy, revenue estimate, medium terms expenditure frame work/Financial Service Providers (FSP) before the commencement of actually budget processes.
He also listed budget request which include, strategic plans, citizens engagement as well as budget call circular as another critical stage of the budget making process, then followed by the budget examination stage.
Continuing, Mainasara said both compilation/collation of data, macro economic update, budget framework as well as discussion and defense, briefing, consolidation, approval and singing into law before production and distribution of the years budget for effective follow up and monitoring.
