The cardinal objective of the Treasury Single Accoun (TSA) is to facilitate implementation of FGN Cash
The TSA is a unified structure of government bank accounts that gives a consolidated view of cash positions.
It is part of the Public Financial Management (PFM) reforms under the Economic Reforms and Governance Projects (ERGP). PFM reforms are a part of key pillars of the National Strategy for Public Service reform towards vision 20:20:20.
The PFM reforms were designed to address impediments to effective cash
In 2009, the FG sought technical assistance from the IMF to advise on the feasibility of the TSA and a mission report was presented in June 2010. With support from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, detailed TSA requirements were developed and in May 2011, the technical report outlining the TSA structure and implementation strategy was approved.
A pilot implementation of the TSA kicked off with the inclusion of 6 MDAs in 2011, 87 MDAs in 2012 and 116 MDAs in 2013.
Before the introduction of the TSA, there were several problems plaguing the government. These problems included: inability of the government to determine its cash position at any point in time, unlimited commercial bank accounts maintained by MDAs, growing domestic debt and borrowing not aligned to need, inability to undertake effective cash planning and management as required by the Fiscal Responsibility Act and excessive use of ways and means in financing budget. With the TSA, these problems have since become a thing of the past.
The Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) is a PFM reform designed to improve the effectiveness of storage of personnel records and administration of monthly payroll of the federal public servants.
The objectives of the IPPIS are to centralize database of civil servants, reduce ghost worker syndrome, minimize wastage of public funds and facilitate easy storage, updating and retrieval of personnel records for administrative and pension purposes.
Over 150,000 civil servants are on the IPPIS platform and it has helped save the FG over NGN100billion since April 2007.
The benefits of the IPPIS are to ensure storage of records in the centralized personnel database, timely processing of staff emoluments on a monthly basis, prompt deduction and remittance to pension funds, cooperatives and other unions, monitoring of utilized funds derived from unpaid staff salaries among other things.
Some of the African countries that have implemented the PFM reforms include Sierra Leone, Tanzania, South Africa, Uganda, The Gambia and Mauritius. The same platform is also in use in other countries like the USA, France, India, Iran, China and the UK.
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