ABSTRACT
Oil revenue is indeed an important component of economic growth of the recipient nations. Therefore, most of the oil-rich nations invest the revenue from the oil sector into the non-oil sectors for strategic reasons. However, over the past five decades there has been a blur in the practicality to fulfilling this purpose in the context of Nigerian economy. So far, there is high inconsistency on the utilization of such oil revenue in Nigeria. Over dependence on oil revenue tends to distort and discourage sourcing of funds from other source by the government, for example, as a result of huge oil revenue flows; countries tend to de-emphasize income taxes as a source of government revenue. Besides, low tax ratios and high consumption expenditures
(typically on imported goods) reinforce inflationary tendencies with regard to expenditure; government pay less or no attention to infrastructural development, encouragement of
Private sector investment, mechanizing the agricultural and manufacturing sector of the economy because of reliance on petroleum revenue. However, it is noted that large proceeds obtain form the domestic sales and exports of petroleum products, acts like a multipliers to other sector of the economy through government expenditure, thus this seek to examine the impact of oil revenue and Nigeria economic growth. The study reveals that the discovery oil in large quantity has increase the flow of FDI in the country, either through purchase or the establishment of new production facilities (green field, investment), the flow of FDI contribute to capital formation and to export earnings, contribution to technological change and growth of the economy. It further confirms all the variables exhibited their expected sign in the short run but exhibited negative relationship with economic growth in the long run except for government expenditure, which has positive relationship with economic growth both in the long run and short run. The study concluded that Government should use the revenue generated from petroleum to invest in other domestic sectors such as Agriculture and manufacturing sector in order to expand the revenue source of the economy and further increase the revenue base of the economy.