Audit: FMC Abeokuta remitted N30.19m of N516.48m due from its 2024 revenue and paid N62.57m for a telemedical centre its 2024 budget does not list

The Auditor-General for the Federation put five queries to the Federal Medical Centre, Abeokuta, about its 2024 accounts. Under "Management's Response" the report prints the same two words five times: "No response." The largest query concerns money the hospital raised itself. It collected N2,065,908,232 in internally generated revenue in 2024, and the auditors counted a quarter of it, N516,477,058, as due to the Consolidated Revenue Fund. According to the report, N30,192,130 was paid in. Vero Record set the queries against the 2024 Appropriation Act, the budget the auditors measured the hospital against. Every budget figure the audit cites for the hospital is in the Act, to the naira, and the hospital's 2024 project list has no line for the telemedical centre it paid N62,567,250.40 for in the last week of the year.

The queries are on pages 528 to 533 of the Auditor-General's 2024 Annual Report on Non-compliance, Volume II (PDF pages 93 to 98), and cover 1 January to 31 December 2024. Each ends with recommendations to "the Chief Medical Director (CMD)", whom the report does not name. In the Appropriation Acts the centre, code 0521027019, sits under the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, led by the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Muhammad Ali Pate. The report makes no finding about the ministry or the minister.

The revenue query rests on a Treasury circular of 22 November 2016, quoted in the report, which says partially funded agencies "should limit their annual budgetary expenditure to no more than 75 percent (75%) of their gross revenue, and remit the 25 percent (25%) to the CRF or pay 80 percent (80%) of their Operating Surplus", whichever is higher. A quarter of N2,065,908,232 is N516,477,058, the figure the auditors expected. Take away the N30,192,130 remitted and N486,284,928 is left, the sum in the query's heading. On these figures the hospital paid in about 5.8 per cent of what the rule required, and could have kept N1,549,431,174 for its own spending. The report does not say where the revenue came from, does not set out an operating surplus calculation, and does not say whether anything was paid in after the audit.

The 2024 Act shows how large that revenue was beside the hospital's federal vote. The Act gave the centre N38,265,362,914: N12,133,111,359 for personnel, N219,037,682 for overheads and N25,913,213,873 for capital projects. The hospital's own revenue was 9.4 times its overhead appropriation, and the unremitted N486,284,928 alone was 2.2 times that appropriation. This is a comparison of scale only: the report does not say how the retained revenue was spent.

The third query is about generator fuel. The auditors say the approved budget for "Plant/Generator Fuel Cost (Code 22020803)" was N94,407,401.08 and the hospital spent N187,212,071.08, which is 1.98 times the vote. The 2024 Act, page 1774, carries line 22020803, "Plant / Generator Fuel Cost", at N94,407,401. The excess is N92,804,670; the query's heading and recommendations give it as N92,804,670.08, while the body of the finding and the subtraction give N92,804,670.00. The report asks the hospital to account for the excess to the Public Accounts Committees of the National Assembly and to recover it.

The fourth query sits on the next page. The auditors say the centre "was allocated the sum of N37,337,954.00" for electricity charges, that there was no evidence of any payment for electricity because "no entries were made in the cash book and no payment vouchers were raised", and that there was no evidence the unused money went back to the Consolidated Revenue Fund. The same page of the 2024 Act lists line 22020201, "Electricity Charges", at N37,337,954. The report does not say whether the allocation was released in cash, whether the hospital paid its electricity bills from another source, or whether the generator spending and the absent electricity payments are connected. It treats them as separate queries.

The fifth query is the telemedical centre. Two payments "totaling N62,567,250.40" were made through the Government Integrated Financial Management Information System to one company "for the construction of a Telemedical Multipurpose Conference Centre". The first, purchase invoice line PI-01196767 finalised on 26 December 2024, was N40,275,000.01 for "the proposed construction of telemedical multipurpose conference center including equipping with (6) telemedical equipment", with the reference "Fmca/intervention/constituency/001/2024". The second, PI-01204944 finalised on 31 December 2024, was N22,292,250.39, described as "final payment" and referenced "Fmca/constituency intervention fund/005/2024". The two add to the report's total. The auditors found that the payments were "neither recorded in the payment voucher register nor reflected in the cash book", that other procurement records were not provided, and that there was no evidence "of job execution, performance bonds, or job completion certificates". The report says the payments were made "within four (4) days"; 26 and 31 December are five days apart.

The auditors also wrote: "There was no evidence to show that the project was provided for in the approved 2024 budget of the Centre." The Act can be checked on that point. Its list of projects for the centre, on pages 1774 and 1775, has 25 lines, and they add to N25,913,213,873, exactly the capital total. None is a telemedical centre. The largest are equipping an open heart surgery complex (N7,393,144,928), completing a cancer treatment complex (N5,306,855,072) and a radio-diagnostic centre (N5,019,087,310). The hospital's project lists in the 2025 Act (pages 1988 and 1989) and the 2026 Act (pages 2394 and 2395) have no telemedical line either. The voucher references point to a constituency intervention, and the page does not rule out that money for it was voted somewhere else in the budget; Vero Record searched only the centre's own pages. The Budget Office said on 7 January 2026 that the 2024 and 2025 Acts had been repealed and re-enacted; the figures used here are from the 2024 Act as first published, which match the auditors' figures.

The first query is about staff. The report says the number on the hospital's IPPIS payroll rose from 3,090 in February 2024 to 3,263 in December 2024, an increase of 173, and that there was no evidence of waivers from the Federal Character Commission or approvals from the relevant authorities for their recruitment. It asks the hospital to justify the hiring and to recover "all amounts paid to the staff as salary and allowances". The report does not say what posts the 173 filled, and the documents do not show whether approvals exist that were not produced for audit.

The hospital's budget has moved since. The 2026 Act gives the centre N34,224,921,348: N17,794,336,023 for personnel, N498,793,311 for overheads and N15,931,792,014 for capital (pages 2240 and 2393 to 2395). The overhead vote is the same, to the naira, as in 2025. Electricity charges, N37,337,954 in 2024, become N180,000,000 in the 2025 Act and N240,000,000 in 2026. Plant and generator fuel, N94,407,401 in 2024 and N144,000,000 in 2025, has no line at all in 2026, where the only fuel line is N90,406,675 for motor vehicles. The 2026 project list includes N500,000,000 for a mini grid at the hospital's Ayetoro annex and N91,000,000 for a power panel building.

An audit query is a query. The heading of the fifth issue reads "Payment for job not executed", but the finding beneath it is that there was no evidence of execution; the report does not say the auditors visited a site or that no centre exists. The "Risks" listed under each issue, such as loss or diversion of public funds, are risks the auditors name, not findings. The queries now sit with the Public Accounts Committees of the Senate and House of Representatives. Vero Record relied on the documents and did not put questions to the hospital before publication.

Set side by side, the two documents agree wherever they meet. The Act carries the N37,337,954 for electricity and the N94,407,401 for generator fuel that the auditors cite, and the hospital's 2024 project list has no telemedical centre. Neither document records the hospital's side: the report shows no reply to any of the five queries, and the N486,284,928 the auditors say was owed to the Treasury from the hospital's 2024 revenue stands in it unanswered.

What this rests on

Office of the Auditor-General for the Federation, 2024 Annual Report on Non-compliance (Vol. II), Federal Medical Centre, Abeokuta, Ogun State, Issues 1 to 5, report pp.528 to 533 (PDF pp.93 to 98), period 1 January to 31 December 2024, read from the page images. 2024 Appropriation Act, Federal Medical Centre Abeokuta (code 0521027019), pp.1773 to 1775 (scanned pages, read as images). 2025 Appropriation Act as passed, pp.1987 to 1989. 2026 Appropriation Act, p.2240 and pp.2393 to 2395. Budget Office of the Federation statement of 7 January 2026 on the repeal and re-enactment of the 2024 and 2025 Acts. All read for this report. Arithmetic re-done: IGR N2,065,908,232 x 25% = N516,477,058; N516,477,058 - N30,192,130 = N486,284,928 (the query total); N30,192,130 / N516,477,058 = 5.8%; N2,065,908,232 - N516,477,058 = N1,549,431,174 retained under the 75% rule. Generator fuel N187,212,071.08 - N94,407,401.08 = N92,804,670.00 (the heading prints N92,804,670.08, an 8 kobo difference); N187,212,071.08 / N94,407,401.08 = 1.98. Telemedical N40,275,000.01 + N22,292,250.39 = N62,567,250.40; 26 to 31 December 2024 = 5 days. Four queried sums N486,284,928 + N92,804,670.08 + N37,337,954 + N62,567,250.40 = N678,994,802.48 (Issue 1 carries no sum). 2024 Act: personnel N12,133,111,359 + overhead N219,037,682 = recurrent N12,352,149,041; + capital N25,913,213,873 = N38,265,362,914; overhead lines N7,493,866 + N37,337,954 + N53,220,000 + N8,655,603 + N94,407,401 + N17,922,858 = N219,037,682; the 25 project lines (4 on p.1774, 21 on p.1775) add to N25,913,213,873. IGR / overhead N2,065,908,232 / N219,037,682 = 9.4; N486,284,928 / N219,037,682 = 2.2. Payroll 3,263 - 3,090 = 173. 2025 Act: N16,840,230,084 + N498,793,311 + N21,432,679,291 = N38,771,702,686; overhead lines N17,065,055 + N180,000,000 + N63,191,205 + N28,710,567 + N144,000,000 + N35,000,000 + N30,826,484 = N498,793,311. 2026 Act: N17,794,336,023 + N498,793,311 = N18,293,129,334; + N15,931,792,014 = N34,224,921,348; other recurrent lines N27,560,152 + N30,000,000 + N240,000,000 + N15,000,000 + N10,000,000 + N40,000,000 + N90,406,675 + N25,000,000 + N20,826,484 = N498,793,311. The 27 named 2026 projects add to N15,902,875,505, N28,916,509 less than the capital total; the gap equals the 'Research and Development' economic line (code 23050101), which has no matching named project in the list.

What this does not establish

What the hospital's N2,065,908,232 of internally generated revenue consisted of, how the retained part was spent, and whether any of the N486,284,928 has been remitted since the audit; the report shows no operating surplus calculation. Whether the telemedical multipurpose conference centre exists or was built, who the company is, and whether money for it was voted outside the hospital's own pages of the 2024 Act (for example as a constituency project elsewhere in the budget); Vero Record searched only the hospital's pages, and did not check whether the re-enacted 2024 Act changed them. Whether the N37,337,954 electricity allocation was released in cash, and how the hospital paid for electricity in 2024. Whether approvals exist for the 173 staff. Who was Chief Medical Director in 2024. Whether the hospital has since answered the queries or appeared before the Public Accounts Committees. An audit query is a query: nothing in this report states or implies that any person committed an offence.