2025 Budget Will Reflect The Core Needs Of The People; Says Hon. Ekpenyong
Hon. Surv. Iniobong Ekpenyong, The Chairman of Uruan Local Government Area, has promised to ensure that the 2025 Budget for Uruan Local Government reflects the core needs of the people.
Hon. Ekpenyong made this known during the stakeholder’s engagement exercise on the Local Government Budget process at Idu.
He said that the Local Government, just like states, is under a constitutional obligation to produce a budget, which is the reason he called for the engagement of stakeholders to make inputs.
The council helmsman noted that the engagement would enable the government to disclose information, key items, and ideas of budget to civil society and the people as well as critical components of budget policy, revenue and expenditure, borrowing, deficits, and financing gap, major expenditure heads, and expected results from the budget.
Hon. Ekpenyong explained that the benefits of Stakeholders’ Budget engagement are enormous as it presents an opportunity for the government to give an account of its stewardship to the electorate regarding the implementation of past budgets and promised to extend the list of stakeholders in subsequent engagement.
“Prior before now, we get project nominations from councilors that will interest the people, but the process is different. I want the collaborative effort of all stakeholders. Let the most pressing needs for the ward reflect on the budget template and not the needs of a particular person or village.
“The template provided for stakeholder participation by the Budget Planning Research and Statistics (BPRS) may not accommodate everyone, but subsequently, I will endeavor to add more stakeholders”, he said.
While appreciating Governor Umo Eno for his dedication to ensuring that Local Government functions effectively as expected, he reaffirmed his commitment to supporting the ARISE Agenda, which aims to ensure open, transparent, and inclusive government by bringing the government closer to the citizens through the exchange of information that would help in budget planning and many other areas.
