2026 Budget: HIV Agency gets N350m to distribute grains in Sokoto

THE National Agency for the Control of AIDS (NACA), the federal agency responsible for coordinating Nigeria’s response to HIV/AIDS, was allocated N350 million in the Federal Government’s 2026 budget for grain distribution project in Sokoto State.

The allocation raises fresh questions about the growing practice of assigning constituency projects to federal agencies outside their statutory mandates.

An analysis of the 2026 Appropriation Act by The ICIR shows that NACA was assigned two separate grain intervention projects worth N175 million each. The projects involve the supply of grains to communities in Isa, Sabon Birni, Gada and Illela Local Government Areas, as well as Gwadabawa, Goronyo, Wurno and Rabah Local Government Areas of Sokoto State.

The allocations are contained alongside the agency’s traditional health programmes, including HIV prevention, treatment and care interventions.

Established in 2000, NACA serves as the national coordinating body for Nigeria’s HIV/AIDS response. Its mandate includes developing policies and strategies for HIV prevention, coordinating implementation among government institutions and development partners, mobilising resources for HIV programmes, and monitoring the country’s response to the epidemic.

Food distribution, agricultural interventions and humanitarian relief programmes do not form part of the agency’s core mandate.

Yet budget records show that beyond its public health responsibilities, NACA has been assigned projects typically associated with agencies involved in agriculture, emergency response or social intervention programmes.

The allocations add to growing concerns among public finance experts and budget transparency advocates about the increasing mismatch between the mandates of federal agencies and the projects they are tasked with implementing.

The discovery comes amid heightened scrutiny of Nigeria’s budgeting process following the controversy surrounding the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council, an entity allocated more than N1.3 billion in the 2026 budget despite the Presidency’s insistence that no such agency exists.

The ICIR reported that the Nigerian Press Council was allocated N329 million for classroom projects and N311 million for streetlight installations across several states, despite its mandate being limited to media regulation and journalism development.

Concerns about agencies implementing projects outside their statutory responsibilities are not new.

In its 2020 Constituency and Executive Projects Tracking Initiative, the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission identified the practice as a major governance challenge and warned that it undermined accountability in public spending.

The anti-corruption agency specifically recommended that “no agency should be allowed to accept and execute any constituency projects outside its mandate or the law.”

The commission argued that assigning projects to agencies without the requisite legal responsibility or technical expertise makes oversight difficult and increases the risk of poor implementation, abandoned projects and waste of public resources.

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Speaking on the implications of assigning projects to agencies outside their mandates, Country Director at BudgiT, Vahyala Kwaga, previously told The ICIR that many such projects are unlikely to be executed because the institutions receiving the allocations are not designed to implement them.

“We need to understand that corruption is not a ‘technical’ matter but one that is fundamental to our governance and government. Not only are monies almost never used for these projects, they are often diverted to other uses or not even released by the Accountant General’s office.

“This would even lead to poor budget performance because the releases intended by the budget were not even made, though they were ‘saved’, by not disbursing them to these so-called projects outside the mandate of MDAs,” he said.

Vahyala noted that there had never been any consequence for these infractions.

“Ordinarily, the NASS should alert Nigerians on suspicious budget line items, since they are meant to be the ‘oversight’ body of the government. However, because the MDAs and the NASS are in bed together, there will be no way either of them will work in the interest of the people or ensure savings, value for money, and efficiency of government spending,” he said.

The late President Muhammadu Buhari had joined the ICPC, BudgiT and other stakeholders to condemn the implantation of several constituency projects by federal lawmakers.

The ICIR, in its Open Contract Reporting project, reported many constituency projects poorly implemented or abandoned in local communities.

Nurudeen Akewushola is an investigative reporter and fact-checker with The ICIR. He believes courageous in-depth investigative reporting is the key to social justice, accountability and good governance in society. You can reach him via nyahaya@icirnigeria.org and @NurudeenAkewus1 on Twitter.