Group Observes Low Mid Year Budget Performance

By Udeme Hosea

A two day United States Agency for International Development (USAID)  State Accountability, Transparency and Effectiveness  (State2State) Activity,  Akwa Ibom State Civil Society Organisations meeting to review CSOs’ implementation of action plans and mid year state  budget performance for the last quarter of 2024 has ended in Uyo with a call to the state actors to give equal attention to all the sectors in implementing the approved state  budget.

The Coordination meeting which took place at Rosmohr Gold Hotel, Uyo on 15-16 August 2024 had stakeholders in the priority sector of Health Care, Education and WASH in attendance.

The meeting reviewed implementation of Community Charter of Demand (CCD)  projects in the state and Local Government Areas including Gender Equality and Social Inclusion  (GESI) responsive projects, State of Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) policy, Education sector mid year performance 2024, Health sector mid year performance, WASH sector  mid  year performance and GESI sector performance among others.

The Civil Society Organisations also analysed the Akwa Ibom State total budget expenditure in key sectors in 2024 (Education, Health and WASH) and observed a  low performance across the 3 sectors with an overall utilization rate of 18.7%, noting that, some sectors have utilized less than 25% of the  allocated  budget.

At the end, the Civil Society Organisations recommended that the attention that is given to the administrative sector of the state  should be given to key social sectors in terms of releases.