Osun Commissioner for Economic Planning and Budget, Prof. Olalekan Yinusa on Monday said the present administration will not abandon any project, hence the need to formulate a budget that is revenue driven, realistic, doable and can perform.
The Commissioner made this assertion while addressing sectors which appeared on day one of the bilateral meeting on the formulation of the 2021 budget of the State of Osun.
Yinusa explained that Governor Gboyega Oyetola wants the budget to focus mainly on the demands of the people which were gathered during the thank you tour embarked upon by the Governor as well as the outcome of the citizens’ needs assessment which was done across the 30 Local Governments and one area office as mainstreamed in the state of Osun development plan, 2019-2028 and cascaded to medium term sector strategies.
The don, who posited that the best way for a government to deliver the desired value to the people is by listening to their demands and ensuring that their demands are met,further stressed that crafting a realistic and doable budget guarantees that there is no abandoned project in the State.
He recalled that Oyetola’s government has from day one of his administration showed the determination to run an inclusive government which will be about delivering on what the masses actually want.
Said he: “What we are after is that we don’t want any abandoned project in our State. The only way we can achieve this is by formulating a budget that we all know can deliver. We can not just put anything we feel like into the budget.”
“We should be concerned about how we can deliver value, we need to prioritize what we want to do out of endless wants since we can not solve all societal problems with one year budget, so we need to be systematic, pragmatic and strategic in the design of the budget.
“We want to achieve so many things at the same time, but we must ensure that important things are not left out. Budget formulation has gone beyond copy and paste. Everything the Governor is doing is encapsulated in his promises to the people during his campaign, the thank you tour and what was gathered during the citizen needs assessment as embedded in the State Development Plan”,the Commissioner further clarified.
The bilateral meeting continues today with the education Sector.