Banishing poverty from Nigeria in our lifetime: My alternative 2020 budget

By Ayo Akinfe

(1) Receipts from oil revenue are estimated to to be $16bn in 2020 based on an output of 1.6m barrels a day selling at a price of $55 a barrel. Nigeria only receives about half of crude oil receipts due to joint venture agreements we have with our partners, so we will not rely on petroleum product prices to fund the budget

(2) Our total spending projection for the year will be $100bn with $50bn of this going on capital projects like road construction, building railway networks, power plant construction, building schools, hospitals, libraries, clinics, etc

(3) A total of $20bn, or 20% of the budget will be spent on education under a radical plan to totally eradicate illiteracy by 2030

(4) We will introduce a 60% faith tax on all religious houses to help raise revenue. We estimate that as much as $20bn can be raised from these wealthy places of worship and their millionaire clergymen

(5) Faith houses that invest in manufacturing facilities will get tax rebates. Anyone that opens factories and employs workers will be eligible for this rebate

(6) There will be an annual Private Jet Tax introduced. This will constitute 10% of the value of such aircraft. A failure to pay up will lead to the seizure and auctioning of the aircraft

(7) Our faith houses will be encouraged to pool their resources together and create a Nigerian conglomerate called Man of God PLC. The federal government will take out a minority stake in this company in the hope that it will serve as the bellwether of the Nigerian economy with a presence in aviation, food processing, automobiles, manufacturing, shipbuilding, etc

(8) There will no longer be any government funding of religious pilgrimages

(9) There will be no government funding of traditional institutions or monarchies

(10) A new tax police department will be established with the aim of increasing the gross domestic product (GDP)-to-tax ratio to 30% from the current 6%.