The Senate on Tuesday passed the ₦43 trillion 2024 and 2025 Appropriation Act (Repeal and Re-enactment) Bills, following the adoption of the report of its Committee on Appropriations.
The resolution came after the chamber considered and approved the consolidated report presented during plenary by Solomon Adeola (APC, Ogun West), the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriations.
Presenting the report, Adeola explained that the bills sought to repeal and reenact the 2024 and 2025 Appropriation Acts to reflect fiscal adjustments necessitated by economic realities and implementation challenges.
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According to him, the 2024 Appropriation Act was repealed from an initial ₦35.005 trillion and reenacted at ₦43.56 trillion, with the increase largely driven by an additional ₦8.5 trillion injected into the capital component to address security, humanitarian and economic emergencies.
He added that the 2025 Appropriation Act was also repealed from ₦54.99 trillion and replaced with ₦48.316 trillion, with ₦6.674 trillion rolled over into the 2026 fiscal year due to funding constraints.
“The repeal and reenactment seek to balance responsiveness with fiscal responsibility, ensuring that debt expenditure does not weaken legislative oversight or undermine fiscal prudence,” Adeola said.
He noted that the committee’s engagement with the economic team revealed that running multiple budget cycles concurrently had continued to undermine budget clarity and fiscal discipline, stressing that the new framework was aimed at addressing the distortion.
The committee further recommended that the implementation of the 2025 budget be extended to March 31, 2026, particularly for capital expenditure tied to the Development Fund.
Contributing, Jibrin Barau, Deputy Senate President, commended the Appropriations Committee for what he described as an exceptional job completed within a limited timeframe.
“This is a top-notch report, best of the best, and crafted within a very short period of time. We gave them only two days,” Barau said, urging the Senate to pass the report without further debate.
Several senators, including Sani Musa (Niger East), Adetokunbo Abiru (Lagos East) and Chief Whip Tahir Monguno (Borno North), also praised the report, citing its emphasis on infrastructure spending, fiscal discipline and the move to end the practice of overlapping budgets.
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After the Senate resolved into the Committee of Supply and approved the report, the bill was put to a voice vote at plenary, where the “Ayes” prevailed, paving the way for its passage for third reading.
Ruling on the passage, Senate President Godswill Akpabio described the development as a major reform step.
“For me, this is again a major transformative step by Mr. President, well guided, and one that ensures transparency in financial matters,” Akpabio said, congratulating senators for their support.
