The National Assembly was agog on Wednesday, as the details of the harmonised 2016 budget passed by the Senate and House of Representatives was presented to the Clerk of the National Assembly (NASS) for onward transmission to President Muhammadu Buhari for assent.
President Buhari had declined to bow to pressure from NASS to append his signature to the N6.060 trillion budget summary earlier presented to him by the clerk of National Assembly (CAN).
While Danjuma Goje, chairman, Senate Committee on Appropriations accompanied the Senate President Bukola Saraki to the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT), Abdulmumin Jibrin, chairman House Committee on Appropriations proceeded with the presentation of the budget details at about 4:54pm in a brief ceremony done behind closed doors.
Reacting to the alleged padding of the Constituency project budget, Jibrin who dismissed the insinuation, argued that nobody will accuse the NASS of padding the budget and the Constituency project budget when the final copy is made public.
“Yes, we have just submitted the details of the 2016 Appropriation Bill to the Clerk of the National Assembly for onward transmission to the Executive arm of government.
“Well I don’t know what you mean by surprises, of course you know the challenges that the budget came with, again we have gone through that over and over but even with that, we were able to all put our hands on the table and we have been able to do a lot of cleaning up exercise and working 15, 16, 17 hours every day.
“Yes we have done the very best we can but we continue to plead to Nigerians for their understanding. We do know what is going on, we share their pains and we are also living in this country. We just want Nigerians to understand that this year, it is a different budget, we have not had such a challenging budget before.
“Of course you know we have worked on the details and when I was coming in, I tried to answer some questions whether there were inputs? Of course there were inputs of lawmakers on the details.
“The details you are faced with, what the Executive arm of government want or what the lawmakers want but the case of the appropriation committee is to find a middle ground between both, but I think the budget we just signed off with my colleagues in the Senate, to the best of our knowledge it is an implementable budget and to a large extent, we believe that it properly aligns with the policy thrust of the government.
“Well of course we have done our own part, the budget will be transmitted to the President and so we keep our fingers crossed.
“That’s not my own question, we have submitted the budget. The presidential advisers of the National Assembly will come over to pick the details. I have called both of them and they are aware that the details are ready,” Jibrin said.
Speaking on the delay in computation of the budget details, Jibrin argued that “there was not anything untoward going on but rather so we could correct all the inconsistencies, errors, omissions and padding in the document submitted to us in December last year.”
He also stated that the budget being the most important economic policy tool of government, provides a comprehensive statement of priorities as a nation.
“As representatives of the people, the National Assembly remains the appropriate place to ensure that the details of such a document best match our national goals and aspirations.
“Therefore, what we have been doing in these past few weeks is to balance the projections for revenue against the estimates for expenditure, based on the reality of our situation today,” he said.
Jibrin also said that it was unfortunate that task has been made very difficult by the sloppy manner in which the 2016 Appropriation Bill was prepared by the executive.
“Many of the officials who came before our various committees practically disowned the inputs from their own departments and ministries. In most instances, and across several agencies, the bill that was initially presented to us failed in many respects to connect with the policy thrust of the government and the needs of our people.
“That is aside the fact that most of the figures simply did not just add up. It was one of the most controversial budgets that ever came to the National Assembly from the Executive,” he said.
While commending President Buhari in resolving the crisis that trailed the alleged padding of the budget, Jibrin said the President has showed leadership and intervened which has helped in resolving what had become a serious logjam, adding that some officials in the executive arm have also been removed from their duty posts because of those glaring lapses.
“That happened because the president took direct responsibility and got involved in the process, not only to ensure synergy between the executive and the legislature but also so that we could both arrive at a budget that is implementable for the good of all Nigerians.”
KEHINDE AKINTOLA
