Nigeria seeks $2bn oil account for projects

Lagos - Nigeria's 36 state governments requested to withdraw $2bn from the country's $4.11bn oil savings account to complete projects and provide security ahead of February polls, Timothy Odaah, the chairperson of the States' Commissioners of Finance Forum, said on Wednesday.

Revenues to be distributed to the country's three tiers of government in October - federal, state and local - were 593.33bn naira, down from 603.5bn naira in September, Accountant General Jonah Otunla said.

Central government revenues rose to 536.69bn naira in October, up 6.9% from September owing to improvements in crude revenues, despite a sharp fall in global oil prices, Otunla also said.