By Olusegun Lawrence Members of the Senate were stunned Thursday when a fresh budget proposal of N4.4 trillion meant for 52 Federal Government agencies, including the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) resurfaced on the order paper for reconsideration.
Deputy Leader, Abdul Ningi, representing Bauchi had read the budget proposals of the agencies for 2014 for consideration at plenary.
The details of the N4.4 trillion budget proposal include N3.5 trillion budgets for the NNPC and N377 billion for the CBN while the remaining amount is for other agencies.
Prompt News recalls that both Chambers of the National Assembly had passed a total national budget of N4.6 trillion, which is still awaiting Presidential assent.
The budget proposals were presented for consideration in line with the Fiscal Reasonability Act that all agencies must submit their budget to National Assembly for consideration.
However, Senators including James Manger contended that all the Heads of Agencies with the exemption of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had appeared before the various committees and defended their budgets.
According to him, since the 2014 budget appropriation has been passed by the two Chambers of the National Assembly, what Nigerians are expecting is presidential assent so that implementation could begin.
Also, raising point of order, order 26/6, Eyinnaya Abaribe said that the Senate has dealt with the matter of 2014 budget and there was no need of going back to it again.
Following information by the Chairman, Committee on Rules and Business that the document is from the Budget Office of the Federal Ministry of Finance, members agreed to go ahead with its consideration.
However, they insisted that agencies whose budgets had been considered and passed earlier would not be reconsidered now.
