The Federation Accounts Allocation Committee (FAAC) on Thursday shared N575.46 billion among the three tiers of government from the Federation Account for January 2013.
Dr Yerima Ngama, the Minister of State, Finance, made this known to journalists in Abuja after the monthly FAAC meeting.
He said the gross revenue for the federation account in January was N651.26 billion, higher than the N581.05 billion earned in December.
He attributed the increase to a significant boost in the Petroleum Profit Tax in January as a result of upward review of estimates and payments by NNPC and other oil companies.
A breakdown of the figures distributed in January showed that the Federal Government received N216.52 billion (52.68 per cent), state governments, N109.77 billion (26.72 per cent) while local governments got N84.02 billion.
According to the minister, the Value Added Tax (VAT) distributed for the month was N65.29 billion as against N57.53 billion in December.
He added that a total of N47.43 billion, representing 13 per cent oil derivation, was shared among the oil producing states for December.
The minister gave the current balance of the Excess Crude Account (ECA) as 9.22 billion dollars after N187.8 billion was lodged into the account in January.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that one billion dollars was withdrawn from the ECA in December 2012 for the payment of subsidy claims to oil marketers.
The withdrawal came after the National Assembly approved a supplementary budget of N161 billion.
Also, another one billion dollars was withdrawn in January for distribution to the 36 states and the FCT, following requests by the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF).
The Federal Government had approved the distribution of the amount to enable the 36 states and FCT execute ongoing projects.
On NNPC’s indebtedness to the Federation Account, the minister said the corporation had continued its monthly refund of N7.6 billion for onward distribution to the tiers of government.
He said NNPC had consistently made a total of 18 payments to the Federation Account since the refund started and had 14 payments left to be made.
Also, N35.54 billion was distributed to the three tiers of government under the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment (SURE-P) programme.
NAN reports that SURE-P was initiated in 2012, following the partial removal of subsidy on fuel.
Since April 2012, FAAC has been transferring N35.54 billion every month for distribution to the three tiers of government.