Abstract:
This work was on comparative study of budgetary allocations to health and other departments in local government areas (LGAs) of Ebonyi State from 2010 – 2014.
The researcher was motivated to carry out this study by the poor state of health infrastructure in many parts of the rural communities of the Local Government Areas of Ebonyi state and also by the insinuations that other departments such as Education, Agriculture and works/environment perform better than health department. The study has carried out with a view to ascertaining the actual figures of budgetary allocations to the LGAs of Ebonyi state from 2010 – 2014, determining the budgetary allocations to health and those of selected departments in LGAs of Ebonyi State from 2010 to 2014 and ascertaining whether the budgetary allocations to health department in the LGAs were adequate in line with the African Union (AU) stipulation of 15% of total annual budget to the health sector of every level of government in Africa. Descriptive research design was employed for the study. No sampling technique was used to select local governments to be studied since all the 13 LGAs were selected because of the few number, giving a total population of 13. A self development proforma was used to extract relevant data from the 65 copies of the budgetary estimates of the 13 LGAs for the 5 year period. The face and content validity of the instrument were determined by the supervisor and one other lecturer who is also an expert in management and administration. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data generated and results were presented in tables as percentages. Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient was used to determine the relationship between the budgetary allocations to health and that of other departments at 0.05 level of significance. Major findings of the study showed that in 2010, Health budget had significant positive correlation with that of Agriculture (r = 0.65, P = 0.022). In 2011, Health had significant positive correlation with Agriculture (r = 0.59, P = 0.033) and Education ( r = 0.63, P = 0.022). In 2012, Health had significant positive correlation with Agriculture (r = 0.60, P = 0.031). In 2013, Health had significant positive correlation with Agriculture ( r = 0.58, P = 0.037). In 2014, Health had significant positive correlation with Education (r = 0.70, P = 0.007). Within the five year period, Works/Environment Department had the highest budget and Agriculture had the lowest. Only 6 LGAs met the 15% stipulation by African Union. It was recommended that health budgets in LGAs of Ebonyi State should be stepped up to meet AU stipulation of 15% and that budgetary allocations to the various departments should be balanced.
