The Federal Government has recorded a deficit of N101.3 billion arising from its fiscal operation during the first seven-months of 2004.
The Central Bank of Nigeria, which announced this in Abuja on Sunday, said the N101.3 billion government deficit was financed from ways and means advances from the apex bank, excess crude proceeds and other funds.
The CBN in a document prepared for a meeting of its Monetary Policy Committee coming up on Tuesday, said that the deficit represented an increase of 7.9 per cent over the N110 billion recorded in the corresponding period of 2003.
According to CBN, the deficit, which represents 56 per cent of the target of N181 billion for the year, arose due to the higher expenditure of the Federal Government in the seven months as against its retained revenue.
According to CBN, while the cumulative expenditure of the government for the seven-month period was N800.9 billion, its retained revenue stood at N699.6 billion.
It added that debt service payments accounted for N143.7 billion or 24.8 per cent of the total expenditure in the seven months.
The document read in part, �The cumulative expenditure was N800.9 billion, as against N690 billion in the corresponding period of 2003. Of the total cumulative expenditure, recurrent expenditure, capital expenditure and transfers accounted for 72.3, 24.9 and 2.8 per cent, respectively.
�The retained revenue of the Federal Government from January to July, stood at N699.6 billion. This represented an increase of 6.9 per cent and 20.6 per cent, over the proportionate budget estimate of N560.69 billion and the level in the corresponding period of 2003 of N579.9 billion.�
The CBN also noted that the federally collected revenue from January to July 2004 stood at N2.096 trillion, showing a positive variance of 18.5 per cent and 50.6 per cent over the budget estimate for the period and the level in the corresponding period of 2003, respectively.
The month of July, according to the CBN, accounted for N125.1 billion of the retained revenue of the Federal Government, representing an increase of 20.1 per cent and 33.9 per cent over the monthly budget estimate of N93.45 billion and the preceding month�s value of N104.1 billion, respectively.
The total expenditure for July was N89.9 billion, which, however, fell short of the monthly budget estimate by N16.7 billion or 17.2 per cent, while the total federally collected revenue for the month stood at N347.5 billion, representing an increase of 37.5 per cent and 6.8 per cent over the monthly budget estimate and the receipts in the preceding month, respectively.
The document said further, �Of the total expenditure, recurrent expenditure accounted for N88.5 billion or 98.4 per cent, while transfers accounted for the balance. The fiscal operation of the federal government in July resulted in a surplus of N35.2 billion.
�Oil revenue was N289.6 billion and accounted for 83.3 per cent of total while non-oil receipts at N58 billion accounted for the balance,� it added.
Besides, the CBN disclosed that the Federal Sub-Treasury account as at August 31, 2004 recorded a debit balance of N66.01 billion, while the Central Capital Account had a credit balance of N88.52 billion.
In its 2004 Appropriation Act, the Federal Government had projected federally collectible revenue of N3.02 trillion while the federal government�s share of revenue was projected at N1.12 trillion.
The estimated federal government expenditure for the year was N1.3 trillion, the debt service payments, N369.4 billion while the fiscal deficit was N181 billion.
