The Senate on Tuesday began debate on the 2014 Appropriation bill with members disagreeing along party lines on its passage.
While the Peoples Democratic Party
senators commended the bill and called for its immediate approval,
their All Progressives Congress counterparts sought its rejection and
return to the Executive for a rejig.
To the PDP senators, the appropriation
bill should be passed because it would promote economic growth and add
fillip to the Transformation Agenda of the Goodluck Jonathan
administration.
But the APC lawmakers believed that it
was not packaged to empower the people and address insecurity in the
country, especially in the North-East.
In fact, one of the APC lawmakers, who
said the bill “does not worth the paper it was written on,” called
for the resignation of the Minister of Finance and the Supervising
Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, because she had
disappointed Nigerians.
Before the lawmakers started making
their contributions, the President of the Senate, David Mark, had
enjoined them to use “national magnifying glasses to view the
budget instead of reducing it to partisan politics.”
The Senate Leader, Victor Ndoma – Egba,
in the lead debate, had explained that the budget was premised on the
2014 -2016 Medium Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper,
which took into consideration, the heightened global economic
uncertainty in 2013.
He attributed the drop in the 2014
budget estimates to the challenges caused by oil theft, pipeline
sabotage and production shut-ins at oil fields.
Ndoma – Egba said in spite of the drop,
the financial framework would add impetus to the transformation
agenda of the current administration.
The Senate Leader added that the budget
was laudable because it would promote economic growth, wealth creation,
service delivery and employment opportunities.
He, however, faulted the non-equitable
distribution of the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme
Funds and the reduction in the allocation to the Judiciary in the
budget.
But he went ahead to urge his
colleagues to support the budget’s second reading and committal to
committees for further consideration.
The Deputy Senate President, Ike
Ekweremadu, also appealed to his colleagues to take the debate on the
budget with all seriousness it deserved because it was key to the
implementation of ongoing projects in the country.
He, however, expressed concern that
some critical projects being executed in various parts of the country
were not captured in the 2014 budget.
Senator George Akume stressed the need
for the Ministry of Finance to forward to the National Assembly, the
necessary documents on the Fiscal Responsibility Bill to aid
deliberations on the 2014 budget.
He described the N268.3bn SURE-P Fund as an omnibus and wondered the real purpose of the money.
The lawmaker called for the
prioritisation of the issues that would be accommodated in the budget
based on the nation’s expenditure profile in the next three years.
The Chairman, Senate Committee on
Information, Media and Public Affairs, Senator Eyinnaya Abaribe, urged
the lawmakers to follow the example of the APC-controlled Rivers State
by passing the budget without further deliberation.
Senator Issa Galaudu also urged them
to support the bill, but faulted the implementation of the 2013 budget,
especially the decision of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation
to spend $8bn on kerosene subsidy.
Galaudu noted that the poor
implementation of budgets had been a major challenge since 1999,
because they had continued to grow.
He said, “From N947bn in 1999 to N4.6 tn
today, it has grown by over 400 per cent, yet, the impact has not been
felt by all Nigerians. There are some bloated expenses. Even with huge
security budget, every MDA has security provisions. All these make
capital expenditure smaller.”
Senators Paulinus Igwe, Phillip Aduda
and Giang Pajok, all supported the passage of the budget but stressed
the need for increased allocation to the Federal Capital Territory,
defence and the judiciary.
However, most of the APC members who
contributed to the debate like Senators Ahmed Lawan, Alkali Jajere,
Abubakar Yar’Adua, Abdulmumuni Hassan and Babajide Omoworare, condemned
the budget and asked their colleagues to reject it.
Lawan, who described the budget as anti
-people, said it was packaged to further boost the economic power of
politicians, senior civil servants and high networth industrialists.
He stated that 74 per cent of the N4.6
tn was set aside for recurrent expenditure while 26 per cent was
for capital projects.
The senator wondered while over N100bn
was allocated to the Niger Delta, which is currently enjoying relative
peace while only N2bn was allocated to the North- East, which is
experiencing a high level of insecurity.
He said, “I want to clarify that I have
nothing against the South-South or the Niger Delta. But what I am
saying is that the funds proposed for defence are far low compared
to the amount earmarked for 30,000 militants and the Amnesty Programme
in the Niger Delta.
“The amnesty programme and the 30,000
militants will have N52bn while defence will have just about N34bn. And
what we are saying is that we have a state of emergency in the
North-East and that security agents should be well funded.
“Why don’t we fund the security agencies
better when you are taking so much money for what is, in my opinion,
not more important than the security of our people. I believe that
while fighting insurgency, we need to have a special package or
special funding or some kind of Marshal Plan for the North- East.
“And for the proposal for N2bn, I say we
reject it as North-East Development Initiative by the Federal
Government compared to N163bn going to the Niger Delta. Are we serious
about tackling the problems in the North-East?”
Lawan asked the National Assembly to
rework the budget, leave whatever was proposed for the Niger Delta, but
make appreciable funds available for the North-East.
He then called for the immediate
resignation of Okonjo-Iweala over her failure to reduce the
recurrent expenditure in the 2014 budget.
He said, “74 per cent is what was
provided as recurrent expenditure in 2011 when this administration came
in. In 2013, it went down to 71, now we have gone back to 74. How many
people are going to enjoy the recurrent expenditure?
“What we are saying is that only about
13 per cent is going to the masses of this country. How do you create
jobs and alleviate poverty, the people must be at the centre. They
should be at the centre of the implementation of the budget.
“We cannot have peace when we spend
much of our funds on ourselves. We have to spend the bulk of our funds
on the people so that everybody will have something to do and everybody
would be safe.
Yar’Adua also said the budget “does not
worth the paper on which it was written because it does not hold
anything for the common man. Everything in the budget is for the
political class, for the rich and the bureaucrat.”
“Is our economy better today than 15
years ago? Are we more developed today than we were 15 years ago? , he
asked, adding, “I want Okonjo -Iweala to resign because she has
disappointed us.”
Omoworare said, “Having listened, it
looks as if we have surrendered our legislative duties to the Executive.
The budget belongs to the parliament and it is our responsibility to
tinker with it.”
He called for the invocation of Section 82 of the constitution to allow the lawmakers the time to dissect the budget .
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