Kebbi emerges Nigeria’s third most transparent State

By Abubakar Yunus

Kebbi State has emerged as Nigeria’s third most transparent state in public financial management after scoring 98 per cent in the second quarter 2025 States Fiscal Transparency League released by civic-tech organisation BudgIT.
According to a statement issued on Sunday by the Kebbi State Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning and titled, “Kebbi Sets the Pace: How a State Ministry Turned Budget Transparency into a Governance Story,” the state ranked third among the 36 states of the federation, behind only Ekiti and Gombe.
The ministry said Kebbi’s performance reflected sustained reforms in fiscal openness rather than a one-off achievement.
It added that the state maintained its position among Nigeria’s leading transparent states across subsequent quarters of 2025 as BudgIT adopted stricter assessment criteria heading into 2026.
The statement noted that the ministry had prioritised the timely publication of key fiscal documents, including the approved state budget, quarterly Budget Performance Reports and the Citizens’ Budget to improve public access to government financial information.
It explained that the consistent release of these documents was in line with BudgIT’s transparency indicators, which assess the timely publication of budget implementation reports, accessibility of fiscal data and functionality of e-procurement disclosure platforms.
“For a Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning that has spent the better part of the last two fiscal years rebuilding how the state discloses and communicates public money, the ranking is less a trophy than a data point confirming a deliberate strategy,” the statement said.
The ministry also highlighted the development and implementation of the 2026-2028 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework, describing it as a key instrument for strengthening long-term fiscal planning and enhancing investor confidence.
According to the statement, the framework provides a multi-year revenue and expenditure outlook that aligns annual budgets with the state’s development priorities.
The ministry further said it established the Open Kebbi portal, a dedicated online platform designed to make budget and policy information easily accessible to citizens, journalists, researchers and civil society organisations.
It said the platform was created to ensure fiscal information was presented in a user-friendly format rather than remaining buried in technical government documents.
“The platform reflects a point BudgIT itself has repeatedly emphasised in its reporting: that fiscal websites need to be usable, navigable and provide data that is machine readable if transparency scores are to translate into genuine public accountability,” the statement added.
The ministry disclosed that it had sustained the momentum in 2026 by promptly publishing the approved 2026 state budget, continuing the quarterly release of Budget Performance Reports and commencing work on the 2027-2029 Medium-Term Expenditure Framework.
It described the measures as evidence that transparency had become an institutional culture rather than an occasional public relations exercise.
The statement added, “A Ministry decided that citizens should be able to see the budget, understand it and track whether it was implemented as promised, and then built the systems, the website and the reporting habits to make that true, quarter after quarter.”
The ministry expressed optimism that sustained fiscal transparency would deepen public trust, strengthen accountability, attract development partners and improve investor confidence in Kebbi State’s economy.