Updated: Finally, 2017 budget laid at the Senate

The much awaited 2017 budget has just been laid at the Senate by the chairman of appropriation committee, Senator Danjuma Goje.

He was Seconded by Senator Sunny Ogboji.

Senate President, Bukola Saraki said the work done by the Senate Budget committee, was commendable, as he informed that the red chamber would circulate the Printed copies by Wednesday.

In December, President Buhari presented the N7.298 trillion budget spending plan for the year to the National Assembly for appropriation.

The proposed record budget which is higher 20.4% higher than 2016 estimates

contains an expansive spending to take the ailing economy out of recession.

It is not clear yet the exact spending that has been approved by the parliament, but experts’ views suggest the law makers would raise the figure, going by past experiences.

Nigerian economy slid into recession second quarter on 2016, but the there are prospects of a rebound in 2017.

The IMF projects that the Africa”s  lagest economy economy could rebound to growth in 2017 with 0.8 percent but wared that the country must implement strong, sound policies to achieve this prospect.

The new budget details is N143 billion higher than the N7.289 trillion budget proposal presented by President Buhari to the joint session of the National Assembly on the 14th December, 2017.

It was later referred to the House Committee on Appropriation on Thursday, 26th January, 2017 for necessary legislative input.

Breakdown of the report laid by Dawaki showed that N434,412,950,249 is for Statutory Transfer; N1,841,345,727,206 is for Debt Service; N177,460,296,707 is for Sinking Fund for maturing bonds; N2,990,920,033,435 is for Recurrent (Non-Debt) Expenditure while N2,174,496,775,867 is for contribution to the development fund for capital expenditure for the year ending 31st December, 2017.

Meanwhile, the breakdown of the N7.298 trillion budget presented by Buhari showed proposed aggregate expenditure of N419.02 billion for Statutory transfers; N1.66 trillion for Debt service; N177.46 billion for Sinking fund to retire certain maturing bonds; N2.98 trillion for Non-debt recurrent expenditure and N2.24 trillion for capital expenditure of N2.24 trillion (including capital in Statutory Transfers).

Analysis of the budget showed increase of N15 billion in Statutory Transfer; N18 billion in Debt Service; N1 billion in Non-Debt Recurrent Expenditure; N16 billion for Capital expenditure while the N177.46 billion proposed do Sinking Fund was retained by the Parliament.

Copies of the report of the Appropriation Committee on the 2017 Appropriation bill are expected to be circulated to all the members to study to enable them contribute to the debate when slated for consideration in the next legislative date.

It is however uncertain whether the actual figure to be passed by the House will tally with the N7,441,175,486,758 stipulated on the Order Paper.