₦airaland Forum

• Says hardwork justifies huge allocation

By Azimazi Momoh Jimoh and John Akubo



The Senate yesterday justified the N125 billion proposed by President Muhammadu Buhari as the National Assembly budget for the 2020 fiscal year.

“The National Assembly has a lot of staff to take care of in both chambers. The number of committees is large too because of the volume of work. So, there is no way we can operate with a small budget,” said spokesman of the Senate, Adedayo Adeyeye, in an interview with The Guardian.

His comment came as Italy’s parliament voted to cut down the number of legislators in both houses. While the Senate will now have 200 lawmakers from 315, the chamber of deputies will have 400 as against 630.

“The bulk of this money is spent on issues that promote legislative operations. Unfortunately, many people believe that legislators take the largest chunk of the money. Our salaries are open for public scrutiny,” Adeyeye said.

“The truth is: it is either we want to have a working and effective National Assembly that is properly funded or we do not. Running the system in the National Assembly is very expensive.”

The spokesman, however, failed to provide details on how the N125 billion would be spent, declaring that he was yet to get the specifics.

The National Assembly has in the past come under intense criticism over its failure to release the details of its budget.

Also, the Senate has reintroduced a bill seeking to establish the National Assembly Budget and Research Office (NABRO).

The Eighth Senate passed the bill on May 3, 2019. Buhari, however, did not assent to it. The proposed office, among other functions, will report yearly to the Senate and House of Representatives all items funded in the preceding financial year for which no appropriation was made by the National Assembly, and all items contained in the Appropriation Act in the preceding financial year but which were not funded by the Federal Government.

Lawmakers, meanwhile, continued debate on the 2020 budget yesterday with Senator Emmanuel Bwacha saying the document does not reflect Nigeria’s readiness to diversify its economy. He also accused his colleagues of being insincere in their handling of the budget.

I’m saying this because, since 1999, budget implementation has not reached 70 per cent. This is very worrisome. We are discussing the 2020 budget estimates. Is it fair to say that we have a 2019 budget, which has not been implemented? As we speak now, nothing has been done. We have the 2019 Appropriation Act and we are discussing the 2020 budget proposal.

“Oversight functions have become a ritual. We have to take it seriously as a parliament. We refused to address this aspect of our shortcomings. We are only prepared to speak from both sides of our mouths. We need to walk the talk if we really want to achieve significant growth in our economy,” he said.

Senator Christopher Ekpeyong said the planned increase in VAT was incompatible with the budget. He explained: “If you increase the VAT to 7.5 per cent today for an investor or a contractor, he will pay educational tax of one per cent, he will pay ITF of one per cent, he will pay NITTF of one per cent, and some times, he goes behind to pay some percentage to the ruling party.

“These taxes are not mentioned. What is the result of the product the man will sell? For that reason, I am not in support of the VAT increase because already the VAT not mentioned is over 9 per cent and if you now add this to this, you will be having 10.5 per cent as VAT in the country.”

Similarly, the vice-chairman, Senate Committee on Tertiary Institutions and TETFund, Ojang Sandy Onor, described Buhari’s attribution of low receipts in VAT to the general election as a cover-up. According to him, the real reason is that the economy is not performing well.

He said: ‘If yesterday when VAT was five per cent we experienced lower levels of economic activities, today that VAT is 7.5 per cent, we risk not having economic activities at all, and the consequences are dangerous.”

But Senator Ajibola Basiru who seemed to support the proposal gave the reason for the lack of full implementation of the 2019 budget. “The budget was not fully implemented because it was passed and signed into law towards the end of the Eighth National Assembly. What struck me is that the revenue projections and infrastructure show a 70 per cent deficit in the 2019 budget, and in 2020, it has already been highlighted that N2.18 trillion will be the proposed deficit,’’ he stated.

“People are looking at the allocation to key sectors and the revenue to fund the projects. For instance, when you talk of the N256 billion being allocated to Works, I have it on good authority that what is even required to take care of the outstanding in the Ministry of Works and Housing is in excess of N500 billion. Yet, many people are hailing the N256 billion allocated for Works, describing it as huge. We should also be looking at the aspect of progressive taxation.”

https://m.guardian.ng/news/nigeria/senate-defends-n125b-budget-for-national-assembly/

As far as e go enter for them........

Funny! Like they were ever going to oppose it.

As long as they will see crumbs pack... Yeye people

Legislooters

Saraki and Dogara had always budgeted nothing less than N150bn



...

Why wont dey defend it..dey defend anything that favors them and turn deaf heaars on we the citizens cry

If you don't belong to them, you won't feel impact of the budget.

Hhmm

Funniest part, nothing like Pdp, Apc, Apga or whatever.

They are all politrickcians

Thieves. B4 nkor

Someone asked why Tammy Abraham rejected Nigeria,

I told him is not football reason, because every sensible man knows he will have more playing time in Nigeria than england.

The reason is sensible youths no longer believe in the nation, they are now looking for other means to secure their future even if it means them selling their blood to other nations.

If u are one of the sensible youth am talking about, I pray God give u that money u are looking for, so u can run away from this nation and APC zombies, to a place where reasonable people like u belong

The insatiable behemoth will surely defend it, a trillion dollars could be defended as well if proposed.

Shameless thieves.

For their own benefit yeye dey smell

where man dey work, n.a. dia him dey chop....Senators i hail una oo

125bn? Smh

Heavy looking budget but if you look closely it's actually empty.

representaTHIEVES and SINators.....see how excited they are at the prospect of cornering a large chunk of our common wealth for themselves.....insatiable, greedy fellows who do next to nothing

If running legislative home is expensive then downsize, most Nigerians can't afford three square meals anymore.

Of course. Me too can defend 50billion if am given.

I just wonder which lies APC wants to use to campaign in 2023. Because they promised Change in 2015, but till today all the terrible practices of government under PDP has continued with APC and it's business as usual, from budget padding to over-inflated budgetary allocations. They should enjoy while it lasts, 2023 is around the corner.

Did anyone expect them to oppose it? This is the time when they will all put party affiliation aside and come together for their collective interest.

We ought to be protecting on the streets right now



This is outrageous
Nigeria is a mess

Duggedised12:
Did anyone expect them to oppose it? This is the time when they will all put party affiliation aside and come together for their collective interest.

These people are born criminals

How zombies lick their backside at any given opportunity still baffles me

Now they are lawmakers not party men. Hardworking lawmakers

MobilityExpress:
I just wonder which lies APC wants to use to campaign in 2023. Because they promised Change in 2015, but till today all the terrible practices of government under PDP has continued with APC and it's business as usual, from budget padding to over-inflated budgetary allocations. They should enjoy while it lasts, 2023 is around the corner.

There was nothing like change

Still the old thieving ways

Watch how and his likes will be praising them with a borrowed data on social media

ZombieTAMER:
These people are born criminals

How zombies lick their backside at any given opportunity still baffles me

the thing is no matter how evil a person is ,there will always be someone out there who relates to it.

Why can't we adopt a part-time "pay as you sit system" of legislature instead of adopting this expensive mode of law making. What hard work are they fronting that they are doing?