Nigeria’s monthly federal allocation has jumped from ₦700 billion in 2023 to ₦4.5 trillion today, Nigeria Revenue Service Chairman Zacch Adedeji said Sunday.

Adedeji made the claim while defending President Bola Tinubu’s economic reforms during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunday Politics, arguing that the impact of the reforms should be assessed using economic data rather than public sentiment.

“Today, we are sharing ₦4.5 trillion. That’s about 530 per cent,” Adedeji said. The NRS chairman dismissed concerns that the increase in government revenue had not translated into improved living conditions for Nigerians, arguing instead that the additional revenue had strengthened the capacity of state governments to meet their obligations.

Adedeji drew on his own record in state government to make the point. Before joining the federal government, he served as Commissioner for Finance in Oyo State from June 2011 to May 2015, a period during which, according to one profile of his career, he pushed the state’s internally generated revenue from roughly ₦600 million to over ₦2 billion a month.

He contrasted that era with the present one, saying state governments no longer come to Abuja begging for bailouts to pay workers.

Adedeji has been at the center of the Tinubu administration’s revenue drive since his appointment. He was named Executive Chairman of the Federal Inland Revenue Service, now the Nigeria Revenue Service, in September 2023, after earlier serving as Special Adviser to the President on Revenue.

The Sunday Politics appearance was part of a broader interview in which Adedeji defended the administration’s reform agenda. He pointed to the removal of the petrol subsidy, the unification of the foreign exchange market, implementation of the Petroleum Industry Act, tighter monetary policy and an ongoing tax overhaul as the reforms driving the improvement in government revenue.

Details on the state-by-state breakdown of the ₦4.5 trillion figure, and independent verification against Federation Account Allocation Committee communiqués, remain unclear.

“How many times have you heard that happen in the last three years?” Adedeji asked, referring to state bailout requests.