Buhari-led administration depletes Excess Crude Account by 97% in six years

The President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration has depleted the Excess Crude Account by a whopping 97 percent in six years, beginning from 2015 when he was first voted into power.

The ECA has been depleted from $2.2 billion in August 2015 to $60.86 million in June 2021. This represents a 97 percent drawdown, according to data sourced from the Central Bank of Nigeria.

The June level of ECA balance also represents a decrease of 15.9 per cent compared to $72.4 million it stood at as at May 18, 2021.

The ECA was created by former President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2004 for the purpose of saving oil revenue in excess of the budgeted benchmark, which once had a balance of $20bn in 2009.

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However, this administration is not the only one that has resorted to ECA to make up for a lack of revenue.

A breakdown of the withdrawals over the years shows that in June 2007 Nigeria’s excess crude stood at $9.43 billion.

Increasing further to $20 billion in January 2009 before falling to $4.56 billion in January 2011.

ECA balance picked up again in December 2012 to $8.65 billion. By November 2013 it had fallen to $4.3 billion and again to $2.45 billion by December 2014.

In May when President Goodluck was leaving office ECA balance was $2.07 billion.

By April 2016 the administration of President Buhari increased it $2.26 billion and this was the last time an increase was recorded.

By December 2018 the ECA account had dropped to $631 million falling further to $324 million in October 2019.

The biggest drop was recorded between 2019 and June 2020 as the ECA balance depleted to $72 million in July 2020.

After hovering around this figure for months up to May 2021, the balance of ECA collapsed to $60.85 million in June 2021.