2-IN-1 STORY: National Assembly Fails To Pass 2016 Budget As Promised; NASS Committee Detects Fresh Flaws In 2016 Budget

National Assembly, Abuja

The National Assembly has dashed the expectation the 2016 budget would be passed this week.

Media report continues:

At joint press briefing, March 2, the chairmen of Senate and House of Representatives Committees on Appropriations, Danjuma Goje and Abdulmumin Jubrin respectively, had said the budget report would be laid March 16 and passed March 17 after consideration.

“After all consultation with the leadership of the House and Senate we can confirm to you that all things being equal we should be able to lay our report of the 2016 Appropriation bill before the House and the Senate on the 16th of March and the consideration, hopefully should be done on the 17th.

“So it is safe for us to conclude that the 2016 Appropriation bill will be passed on the 17th of March 2016,” Mr. Jibrin had said.

The budget was not presented at either chamber on Wednesday as promised.

Addressing journalists after plenary, the Senate Leader, Ali Ndume, announced the postponement of the passage of the budget to next week.

He said the passed budget would be sent to President Muhammadu Buhari for assent before Easter.

He added that the budget report would be laid by the Mr. Goje tomorrow on Thursday while deliberations would hold Tuesday.

The president presented a ₦6.08 trillion 2016 Appropriation Bill, budget proposal, to a joint session of the National Assembly in December 2015.

NASS Committee Detects Fresh Flaws In 2016 Budget

The Punch investigations have revealed that the Senate and House Joint Committee on Appropriation has detected fresh errors in the 2016 budget.

It was gathered that the errors were responsible for the failure of the committee to present its report to the two chambers of the National Assembly on Wednesday as it had promised.

Investigations, however, showed that the errors would not affect the plan of the National Assembly to transmit the budget to President Muhammadu Buhari before Easter as efforts were being made to correct them.

It was learnt that one of the anomalies detected was in the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, where provisions had been made for procurement and installation of security systems every year since 2013.

For example, in 2013, the sum of ₦527,000,000 was budgeted for the item; in 2014, ₦1,161,356,582 was allocated to the same item; in 2015, ₦316,420,274 was budgeted for it; and ₦1,710,322,610 is to be spent on the procurement and installation of security system in the SGF office in 2016.

The committee also detected items without project locations in the Ministry of Works, Power and Housing (headquarters).

Such projects include the construction of a block of three classrooms at the cost of ₦85,592,483; construction of a maternity centre for ₦91,124,858; and the allocation of ₦172,623,767 for the building of skill acquisition centres.

The committee pointed out that oversight function would not be possible without project locations.

It was learnt that the committee also discovered anomalies in the allocation of large amounts of money for the rehabilitation and repair of office buildings as well as purchase of office items and fittings.

Not less than ₦21bn was allocated to such repairs and purchase at the Ministries, Departments and Agencies of the government.

The committee also detected duplication of items. For example, ₦2.3bn was earmarked for former heads of state in the service wide vote of the Ministry of Budget and Planning, while ₦400,190,000 was allocated to the affairs of the former heads of state in the SGF office.

Other examples of duplication include allocation of ₦256,920,000 for the purchase of equipment, vehicles and furniture for the National Bureau of Statistics and the ₦230,705,000 by the NBS for the same purpose.

It was also learnt that the committee discovered instances where allocations for the purchase of items were made without stating the quantities to be bought.

Such include the construction of solar boreholes at the cost of ₦140m in the Ministry of Works, Power and Housing and in the National Power Training Institute, ₦81m was budgeted for operational vehicles.

The committee described some items as curious. These include the allocation of ₦340m for wildlife conservation at the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria and ₦150m for growing girls and women project at the Federal Road Maintenance Agency.

Another curious budgetary item is the refund of ₦2,479,581,721 to states for federal roads, which was placed under the National Intelligence Agency.

When contacted, the Senate spokesperson, Senator Sabi Abdullahi, said the errors had been corrected at the committee stage.

He said that there were no fresh errors and challenged anyone with contrary information to publish the source.

Abdullahi said, “The errors in the budget were identified at the various committee levels. The Appropriation committees of both chambers had jointly scrutinized the document and had come up with an error-free copy.

“As a member of the Senate Committee on Appropriation, I can confirm to you that I am not aware of any fresh error discovered after the joint committee of the two chambers had worked on the budget.

“I challenge anyone with contrary information to publish it together with the source.”

But opposition party lawmakers told The Punch that the report was not submitted because there were still areas to be re-touched.

For example, the Minority Leader of the House, Mr. Leo Ogor, said the report was undergoing “finishing touches.”

Ogor added, “There are areas that require finishing touches. It will cut across several parts of the budget.
“But, I know it is something that will be quickly sorted out and the report will be laid by the grace of God tomorrow (today).”