Dr. David Okelue Ugwunta, Senior Lecturer in Banking and Finance at Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT) and former Honourable Commissioner for Budget and Planning, Enugu State, has brought his practical experience in public financial management and fiscal governance into a national conversation on the digital transformation of military financial management.
Ugwunta was a Discussant at the Fifteenth Nigerian Army Finance Corps Officers’ Biennial Training Conference, held from 9–14 August 2026 at the Nigerian Army School of Finance and Administration (NASFA), Apapa, Lagos. The conference was themed “Leveraging Digital Financial Technology and Professionalism for Enhanced Troops Morale Needed for Mission Success.”
The conference provided a platform for senior officers and financial management professionals to examine how technology, professionalism, accountability and stronger financial controls can improve resource management and support military effectiveness.
In his opening remarks, the Chief of Accounts and Budget (Army), Major General T. T. Sidick, underscored the importance of professionalising and transforming the Nigerian Army Finance Corps (NAFC) to respond to the demands of contemporary military financial management. His emphasis reflected the need for stronger financial controls, professional competence, accountability and the effective deployment of digital technology to improve resource stewardship and provide timely financial information for command decisions.
That institutional perspective provided an important backdrop to Ugwunta’s intervention.
From the Budget & Planning Ministry to the Nigerian Army Finance Corps
Ugwunta participated in the interactive session following the lecture, “Achieving Digital Financial Technology Transformation in the Nigerian Army Finance Corps for Enhanced Financial Management and Effective Decision Support for the Nigerian Army,” delivered by Major General A. A. Ayannuga (Rtd.).
Rather than simply reiterating the technical arguments in the lead presentation, Ugwunta drew on his experience as Honourable Commissioner for Budget and Planning, Enugu State, from 2019 to 2023, during the administration of former Governor Rt. Hon. Ifeanyi Lawrence Ugwuanyi.
As Commissioner, Ugwunta was directly involved in economic planning, budget formulation, implementation monitoring, fiscal policy, and performance reporting. That experience led him to conceive an integrated digital approach to the State’s budget cycle one in which Ministries, Departments and Agencies could prepare or upload budget proposals through an online platform, while the central budget authority could access, review and interrogate submissions during budget bilateral discussions and integrate approved proposals into the final budget.
For Ugwunta, however, the more important question was what happened after appropriation.
His proposed architecture envisaged the digital connection of budgeting, implementation, accounting, reporting, auditing and decision-making, enabling government to see at any point what had been received as revenue; approved, released, committed and spent as expenditure, identify variances and emerging financing pressures, and use the information to advise government and initiate appropriate corrective action.
Beyond Paperless Finance
Ugwunta argued that digital financial transformation should not be reduced to electronic payments or the computerisation of existing processes.
“The future of financial management is not simply paperless finance. It is integrated, intelligent and auditable finance.”
He proposed a Digital Financial Management Continuum:
Planning → Budgeting → Appropriation → Implementation → Accounting → Reporting → Auditing → Analysis → Decision.
In his view, the real value of digital transformation lies in connecting these functions so that the budget, accounting records, financial reports and audit information are generated from a common and reliable information architecture.
He stressed that the NAFC should be able to move from asking simply “what has happened?” to understanding “what is happening, what is likely to happen, what financing risk is emerging and what requires intervention?”
From Financial Data to Decision Intelligence
A central feature of Ugwunta’s contribution was the idea of a secure NAFC financial dashboard capable of providing decision-makers with real-time visibility of approved budgets, revenue, releases, commitments, expenditure, outstanding obligations, performance, variances and emerging financial pressures.
Such a system, he argued, should incorporate management by exception, automatically drawing attention to significant deviations, unusual transactions, underperforming programmes or emerging financial risks.
He also emphasised accounting and auditing as integral components of digital transformation.
Rather than treating audit as an activity that begins after transactions have occurred, digital systems can embed controls into financial processes, generate complete audit trails and use data analytics to identify unusual or high-risk transactions for timely review.
This, he argued, would move financial management from predominantly retrospective reporting towards continuous, risk-based and intelligence-driven assurance.
The position resonates with the broader direction of the conference. The Chief of Army Staff, Lt.-Gen. Waidi Shaibu, represented by Maj.-Gen. Garba Ibrahim who called for tighter financial controls, stronger accountability, digital auditing, financial analytics, cybersecurity and data-driven decision-making, stressing the connection between sound financial management, troop welfare and operational readiness.
From Digital Transactions to Digital Command
For Ugwunta, the ultimate objective is not technology for its own sake.
“The real measure of digital financial transformation should not be how many transactions we process electronically. The test is whether we can transform financial data into reliable information, reliable information into intelligence, and intelligence into informed and smart public financing decisions.”
He however supported the advocate for a phased and multistakeholder implementation approach.
The intervention reflects the convergence of Ugwunta’s academic and public-sector career. In addition to his role as Senior Lecturer at ESUT, he serves as Senior Adviser (Economic) at Thoughts & Mace Advisory and works as an Independent Consultant with UNICEF, Enugu Field Office on Public Finance for Children. His professional work spans public financial management, fiscal policy, economic planning, public debt accountability, governance and development finance.
His participation at the Nigerian Army Finance Corps Fifteenth Biennial Conference therefore represented more than an academic engagement. It demonstrated how lived experience in government can be translated into practical policy ideas for strengthening financial management beyond the environment in which that experience was acquired.
For Ugwunta, the journey is clear: From digital transactions, to digital financial management, and ultimately to digital Corp decision support.