Citizen Participation across the Budget Cycle (NG0031)

Brief Description of Commitment: This commitment will ensure that citizens participate in and make inputs into the budget process, starting with the pre-budget statement, executive budget proposal, budget debate through public hearings in the legislature, implementation, monitoring and reporting of the budget. It will also guarantee that budget information is made accessible to all.

General Problem / Challenge Addressed by the Commitment: There is inadequate citizens' engagement and participation in the budget preparation, approval, implementation, and monitoring process. This results in citizens not having information, and thus not being able to relate with the projects in the budget. This ultimately weakens accountability in resource allocations.

Specific OGP Issue(s) in Focus: 1. Low citizens' participation in the budget cycle. 2. Ineffective management of public resources. 3. Poor public services ratings. 4. Low budget performance.

Rationale for the Commitment: By making budget information available and accessible to all citizens in a timely manner and usable format, this commitment will improve accountability on the part of government, provide openness and transparency in the budget process, and ensure that citizens are engaged throughout the budget cycle.

Main Objective: To ensure that budget planning, approval, implementation, monitoring and reporting meet the needs of citizens and that citizens have open access to budget information in a format that is both human and machine readable.

Anticipated Impact: Improved transparent and accountable citizens-oriented governance, through effective budget implementation.

Expected Outcomes | Milestones (Performance Indicators)

1. Improved timeliness of release of budget document. | 1. Early preparation (early issuance of call circular to the MDAs) and presentation 2. Early passage of the budget by the National Assembly 3. Early Presidential assent to the appropriation bill

2. Increased citizens' participation in budget processes | Level of citizen's satisfaction with the budget process

3. Improved governance, transparency and accountability decision-making by the public. | Percentage of citizens aware of the budget process Percentage of citizens with access to sectoral performance reports

Planned Activities (Start Date - End Date | Expected Output(s) | Output Indicator(s))

1. Conduct Annual Needs Assessment Survey, whose Reports would accompany budgets in selected sectors including Health, Education, etc. (January 2023 - December 2024 | Comprehensive Needs Assessment Reports accompanying Annual Budgets of MDAs in the following sectors: 1. Health 2. Education 3. WASH 4. Agriculture 5. Power | Number of MDAs' Annual Budgets with accompanying Needs Assessment Reports produced)

2. The Budget Office of the Federation to hold twopublic forums for citizens' input into the pre- budget statements using the draft MTSS and MTEF documents as tools/ background documents in these forums. (January 2023 - December 2024 | Two well-attended public forums on pre-budget briefing, with participants from all subsectors of the economy. | 1. Number of public consultations held by the Budget Office of the Federation 2. Compilation of relevant/usable inputs from the citizens report produced.)

3. Conduct of public hearings organized by the National Assembly on the budget. (January 2023 - December 2024 | National Assembly's acceptance to conduct required public hearings on 5 or more priority sectors of the budget. | 1. Number of public hearings on the budget organized by the National Assembly (NASS). 2. Number of Sector public hearings held by the NASS)

4. Mobilize CSOs' and citizen participation in budget hearings. (January 2023 - December 2024 | CSOs' and citizens' willigness and preparedness to attend the public hearings on the budget. | 1. Number of CSOs that attended the public hearings. 2. Number of citizen clusters that attended the public hearings.)

5. Annually publish a comprehensive citizen's guide to the budget. (January 2023 - December 2024 | Two citizens' budget guides published and widely circulated. | Copies of citizens guide (hard/soft copies) printed and circulated each year.)

6. Conduct annual citizens' satisfaction surveys. (January 2023 0 December 2024 | Two Annual Citizens' Satisfaction Survey Reports | Number of Segmented reviews on citizens ' satisfaction across different sub-sectors carried out)

7. Publish in a timely manner all key budget documents to facilitate citizens' participation according to the Fiscal Responsibility Act. (January 2023 - December 2024 | All relevant documents published on time. | Average time for production of key budget documents)

8. Publish MDA budgets, as well as quarterly and annual budget implementation reports on MDAs websites in both human and machine-readable formats. (January 2023 - December 2024 | Sustained availability of the following on MDAs websites in human and machine-readable formats: 1. MDA Budgets. 2. Quarterly MDAs budget implementation reports. 3. Annual MDAs budget implementation reports. | Number of MDAs publishing budget implementation reports in accordance with the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) on their websites.)

9. Update existing technology-based feedback mechanism to give feedback on reported projects for monitoring by government and CSOs. (January 2023 - December 2024 | Application of the selected technology-based mechanism in monitoring of public projects across the country. | Number of public projects that are uploaded on the technology-based feedback platform per budget cycle by government and CSOs.)

10. Enhancing transparency on Import Duty Exemption Certificate (IDEC) and other Customs revenues (January 2023 - December 2024 | Number of companies issued with import duty exemption certificates)

11. Enhancing awareness around TaxPromax (January 2023 - December 2024 | Number of citizens and private sector organizations reached. | Number of awareness outreaches on TaxPromax carried out.)

12. Enhance approaches for an inclusive community participation in allocation of public resources for improved and effective public service deliveries (January 2023 - December 2024 | 1. Advocacy for earmarking the sugar tax for improvement of the health sector allocation. 2. Advocacy for effective implementation of " earmarked" taxes from the total revenue to fund socio-economic sector spending. | 1. Number of tax distribution frameworks developed 2. Number of advocacies carried out on effective implementation of ear-marked taxes from total revenue)

13 . Build community capacity on the use of the Community Charter of Demand. (January 2023 - December 2024 | Development of a Community Charter of Demands | Number of Community Charter of Demand documents produced)

14. Creation of an online Tax Risk Dashboard (January 2023 - December 2024 | 1. A functional Portal showing potentiality of Risk 2. A feedback window for suggestion and whistle blowing | 1. Number of Functional Tax Risk dashboards produced 2. Number of people utilizing the feedback window)

15. Creating Information Cycle to mobilize for the Significant Economic Presence (SEP) Uptake (January 2023 - December 2024 | To reach out to Citizens on SEP to canvas to citizen to report trans itions online if tax elements are not deducted | 1. Number of citizens reached on SEP)

Source(s) of Funding: Federal Government Budget and Donor Agencies

Action Plan Review

Commitment 1. More effective citizens’ participation across the budget cycle

Commitment Cluster 1: Open Budgets [Budget Office of the Federation, Office of the Auditor General of the Federation, BudgIT, Paradigm Leadership Support Initiative, etc.]

For a complete description of the commitment, see Commitments 1 and 2 in Nigeria OGP Action Plan 2023–2025.

Context and objectives

Commitments 1 and 2 aim to reinforce responsible management of Nigeria’s financial resources by strengthening transparency, civic participation, and public accountability in budget and audit processes. Nigeria has a legal framework and institutions that support transparency and accountability in the budget process. Yet the government often falls short of transparency and accountability requirements, such as those laid out in the 2007 Fiscal Responsibility Act, Policy, and Guidelines. [1] With the Budget Office of the Federation and civil society at the vanguard—and support from the Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability Program ^[2]—the government has made progress towards meeting these requirements in recent years. [3]

This commitment builds on open budget reforms advanced under the previous two action plans. [4] Under the last action plan, the government streamlined the budget timeline, increased timeliness in the publication of key budget documents, and modestly strengthened public participation. [5] The Open Budget Survey has reported a steady improvement in the transparency score, from 17% in 2017 to 21% in 2019 and 45% in 2021. [6] However, many of these positive practices are not institutionalised, and public participation in the budget process lags behind transparency efforts.

Nigeria continues to face the competing economic pressures of high levels of poverty, public debt, inflation, and corruption. Nigeria’s change of administration in 2023 has resulted in a shift in government priorities. Yet responsible public financial management remains a priority for Nigerian citizens and civil society. [7] Open budget reforms were identified as a priority in a citizen survey conducted during the co-creation process. [8] Civil society organisation BudgIT highlights that a lack of coherence, timeliness, and openness in Nigeria’s budget process contributes to financial waste and mismanagement. [9]

BudgIT specifically notes the need to strengthen government entities’ compliance with audit recommendations, monitoring and evaluation reports, and Budget Office of the Federation circulars and guidelines. Additionally, civil society notes the need to increase the scope and timeliness of published budget documents and audit reports to enable the government and the public to play their accountability role. In particular, Nigerian CSOs underscore the necessity to further strengthen and update the legal framework underpinning the budget process. [10]

Potential for results:Substantial

This analysis focuses on the milestones under Commitments 1 and 2 that have the greatest potential for results. While several milestones under this cluster are a continuation of existing practices, others aim to implement reforms not achieved under previous action plans or strengthen those underway. This reform’s greatest potential lies in its promise to institutionalise open budget and audit practices and strengthen public participation in budget processes.

Institutionalising open budgeting

Under the third action plan, the Office of the Attorney General of the Federation commits to advocating for the passage of the Federal Audit Service Law. For this commitment to achieve its full potential, the IRM recommends that reformers also seek opportunities to institutionalise open budgeting through the passage of the Organic Budget Law and revising the Public Accounts Committee Act of 2004. Consequently, the National Assembly has a key implementation role in this reform to fulfil its full potential. Identifying and working with champions within the National Assembly will be vital to achieving significant results.

The government’s commitment to pass the Federal Audit Service Law is one of the most promising elements of this reform. A lack of timely and regular performance auditing in Nigeria is a major obstacle to the government’s anti-corruption aims. Factors undermining public audits include a lack of funding for the Auditor General of the Federation, accommodations for audit officers, compliance with recommendations, and a legal mandate to audit government entities established by an Act of the National Assembly. [11] The Federal Audit Service Law would give the Auditor General of the Federation additional powers and resources to carry out its mandate. It would also include provisions for citizen participation in the audit process. The Act was passed in the National Assembly but not signed by the former president under the last action plan. As of October 2023, the Act had passed the House of Representatives. [12]

Commitment 2 aims to enable citizen participation in the Public Account Committee of the National Assembly’s review of audit reports and timely publication of their recommendations. The Public Accounts Committee currently has unlimited time to deliberate on the Auditor General’s Annual Report, which has delayed reports being made public by years. Therefore, opportunities for public participation can be established, and the Public Accounts Committee Act of 2004 could be amended to set a specific timeline for review. [13] Revising the act would be a concrete step to facilitate the timely publication of audit reports as aimed for under this cluster.

While outside the commitment scope, a key opportunity to increase the ambition of this reform would be to pass the Organic Budget Law to institutionalise the Budget Office of the Federation. [14] Government and civil reformers agree that the Budget Office is a leader in government transparency and openness. [15] However, there is low compliance among ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs) with the Budget Office of the Federation’s budget circulars and guidelines. Moreover, the Budget Office does not oversee government-owned enterprises’ budgets. In 2023, Former President Buhari instructed the Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning to mainstream open budget reforms and work with the National Assembly to pass the Organic Budget Law. [16] BudgIT suggests that a Presidential Circular could help to mandate MDA compliance with the Budget Office’s instructions. [17] Either way, reformers agree that a law that backs the Budget Office of the Federation [18] could institutionalise positive open budget practices. [19]

Citizen participation

This reform has the potential to strengthen and institutionalise public participation in the budget process. The Open Budget Survey notes that Nigeria’s score for public participation modestly increased from 21 in 2019 to 26 in 2021. The report showed that public participation was better at formulation (score of 40/100) and approval (score of 33/100). With a low score of public participation at implementation (25/100). [20] Establishing channels for informed and inclusive public participation in budget and audit processes would be a notable departure from existing practice.

Importantly, the National Assembly commits to holding public hearings on five or more priority sectors of the budget and to mobilising CSO and public participation in the hearings. Consistent and inclusive public budget hearings would mark a significant improvement from current practices. In recent years, public budget hearings were either cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic and, when held, only select organisations were invited to attend. Gabriel Okeowo from BudgIT observed that on some occasions, CSOs who would ask difficult questions were not allowed to speak during the hearings. [21] Alfred Okoh from the Budget Office acknowledged that there could be better attendance. This could be addressed by providing advance notice through a calendar and ensuring that the government explains how public input was acted upon. [22] Meaningful participation in National Assembly budget hearings would be a significant step, as the National Assembly’s budget amendments often disregard earlier consultations held by the Budget Office. This not only distorts the coherence of the decisions but also reduces public confidence in the budget process, thus negating the public participation gains. [23]

The Budget Office of the Federation also commits to continuing to hold public forums to collect citizen input on the pre-budget Medium Term Sector Strategies (MTSS) and Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) documents. These documents inform the annual budget. Public consultations on the draft MTEF have been held since 2019. Alfred Okoh [24] reported that the law mandates two public consultation meetings, hosted and funded by the government in a year. He shared examples of the MTEF public consultations [25] and the Public Presentation and breakdown of the 2023 Appropriation Act. [26] Physical meetings have been in public buildings with the capacity to host 300–500 citizens. Complimentary online sessions were hosted, and these reported peak attendance of 1,000–3,500 on Zoom, 20–500 on YouTube, and approximately 10 million live TV broadcasts. [27] These included a question-and-answer session. Of note is the virtual poll feedback that gauged citizens’ perceptions of the MTEF. Findings were shared at the public consultation. [28] As previously noted, the Budget Office can continue deepening participation in MTEF and similar discussions by ensuring communication on how public input is considered and acted on. [29] The government should demonstrate how public consultations influenced these budget documents; otherwise there is a risk that participants will be disillusioned that their efforts are not worthwhile.

Additionally, the government commits under Commitment 1 to continue improving “technology-based feedback platforms.” The government of Nigeria established the Eyemark platform [30] under the previous action plan, which aims to strengthen public oversight of federal capital projects. BudgIT reports that over 50,000 public infrastructure projects have been abandoned by the federal government. [31] Generally, government entities responsible for monitoring and evaluation face inadequate funding and inattention to their findings. [32] As of March 2023, 45,637 federal capital projects had been uploaded to the Eyemark platform. [33] However, the government and CSOs agreed that Eyemark is underused due to low public awareness. In the short term, the government and civil society will need to sensitise the public on Eyemark and demonstrate responsiveness to citizen concerns raised through the platform. Clarity on the government body responsible for updating and responding to citizen input and sufficient resources are key to the platform serving its intended aim. [34] In the longer term, Nigerian civil society recommends that the government’s monitoring and evaluation framework is backed by law to ensure transparency and accountability in government spending. [35]

Milestone 6 continues the aim under previous action plans to conduct annual citizen budget satisfaction surveys. Alfred Okoh [36] highlights that the Citizens Budget Satisfaction Survey was not implemented under the previous action plans because of limited resources and unclear ownership of the survey. He stated that implementation ownership rests with CSOs, who have a mandate to hold the government accountable. [37] The IRM did not find information on milestone 13 to build community capacity using the community charter.

Budget transparency

The government of Nigeria and its civil society partners have made notable progress in advancing transparency of budget documents and information under previous action plans. The 2021 Open Budget Survey report notes that Nigeria has improved on budget transparency from a score of 21/100 in 2019 to 45/100 in 2021. Of the eight budget documents considered in 2021, seven were available to the public, except for the Audit Report. Of those published, five of the seven documents received an average of 78.4 for their comprehensiveness. [38] Most milestones relating to budget transparency under this action plan are a continuation or expansion of existing practices. Reformers are encouraged to fill the remaining budget transparency gaps, institutionalise good practices, and ensure transparency efforts ultimately support informed participation and accountability.

Timely publication of a broader scope of budget and audit documents would continue Nigeria’s positive trajectory towards budget transparency. Under Commitment 1, the government of Nigeria commits to continuing to publish key budget documents promptly and to publish budgets as well as quarterly and annual budget reports for MDAs (milestones 7 and 8). The Budget Office also commits to continuing to publish the Citizen’s Guide to the Budget, as carried out since 2019. [39] Civil society organisation BudgIT notes opportunities to improve include timely publication of the Budget Implementation Report and budgets of state-owned enterprises in the publicised federal budget. [40] Under Commitment 2, the Auditor General of the Federation committed to timely publication of seven quarterly and annual audit reports under milestones 1, 3, and 4. Annual audit reports for 2019, 2020, and 2021 were all published late. Thus, timely publication of the Audit Report during implementation would mark an improvement from existing practice. Notably, the passage of the Federal Audit Services Act [41] would make it mandatory for the Auditor General to publish audit reports as soon as they are submitted to the National Assembly, giving citizens the full picture of the use of public funds.

The Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget, and National Planning developed the Open Treasury platform [42] under previous action plans, enabling citizens to track budget allocations by government MDAs. BudgIT developed a complementary platform [43] to help citizens follow government spending, linked to data in the portal. [44] Opportunities to strengthen the portal under this action plan include building the technological infrastructure to ensure the portal is consistently available and functioning, as well as improving the comprehensiveness and consistency of MDA budget documents. [45] With these improvements, the Open Treasury platform can support the broader aims of informed participation by the public and civil society in Nigeria’s budget process.

Several milestones under Commitment 1 (10, 11, 12, and 14) advance the important aim of increasing government tax revenue but lack a strong connection to open government. These include enhancing transparency on Import Duty Exemption Certificate and other customs revenues, enhancing awareness around TaxPro Max, creating an online Tax Risk Dashboard, and creating an information cycle to mobilise for the Significant Economic Presence (SEP) uptake. Milestone 1, to conduct a needs assessment survey in sectors such as health and education, was continued from the previous action plan as it was not implemented.

Opportunities, challenges, and recommendations during implementation

Open budget reforms in Nigeria benefit from a strong coalition of government, civil society, and international partners who have sought to advance open budget processes across the previous two action plans. However, implementation of the most ambitious activities will depend, in part, on whether this reform continues to receive high-level political support under the new administration. Experience thus far indicates that opportunities for strong implementation include:

· Identify parliamentarians to champion open budget reforms in the National Assembly. Key opportunities to institutionalise open budget reforms will require legislative action by the National Assembly. These include passing the Federal Audit Services Act [46] and the Organic Budget Law [47] and amending the Public Accounts Committee Act. This will require a coalition of advocates within and outside the National Assembly.

· Continue advocacy for political support in the current administration. With the remaining gaps in the legal framework, the change of administration presents a risk to the gains in budget transparency. Therefore, the OGP Secretariat can undertake advocacy activities targeting key leaders in the executive and National Assembly.

· Strengthen feedback to close the loop in public participation. The Budget Office is encouraged to undertake systemised consolidation of feedback received from CSOs and citizens—such as in MTEF and MTSS consultations—with clear processes to report back to citizens on how their input has been acted upon.

· Leverage the strong CSO movement. Nigeria has strong CSOs in the public financial management space, such as Open Alliance, [48] which provides a platform for CSOs to share budget information, conduct pre-budget consultations, and develop a common position. Where government-led spaces are limited, CSOs create spaces and coalesce to push back. There is an opportunity for the Open Alliance to lead the Citizen’s Satisfaction Survey that would hold government accountable.

· Continue existing partnerships for technical support. Nigeria’s journey of fiscal transparency has benefited from technical support from various expert organisations, including PEFA, the World Bank, and the International Budget Partnership. There is an opportunity to continue leveraging these partnerships to deepen transparency and citizen participation.