Following the response of the National Assembly justifying its
distortion of the 2018 Budget, the Presidency felt the need to make
further clarifications.
In four key points below, Femi Adesina explains the presidency’s position on the issue!
1. Throughout the budget consideration process the executive, through
the Ministry of Budget and National Planning, was in touch with the
National Assembly. The executive was approached by the National Assembly
who indicated that they intended to increase the benchmark price by
US$5, from US$45 to US$50. Out of the US$5 increase the National
Assembly informed the Executive that they intended to utilize US$2
(amounting to about N170 billion) for projects selected by themselves.
They asked the Executive to suggest important projects that could be
accommodated with the funds arising from the balance of US$3.
2. After some consideration, the Executive was of the view that an
increase in the benchmark price of crude oil to US$50 was not
unrealistic and the President decided to accept this in the spirit of
compromise required for a successful budget exercise. The Executive had,
in that spirit, suggested that from the additional funds arising out of
the US$3 increase, $1.25 from the increase should not be appropriated
as expenditure, but utilized to reduce the deficit in the budget. The
Executive therefore restricted itself to submitting, for the
consideration of the National Assembly, important items that could be
funded from US$1.75 of the US$3 increase. NASS eventually raised the
benchmark price to US$51, apparently to accommodate the additional
allocations to Health and NDDC.
3. The Executive is therefore surprised that with an additional sum
of N170 billion Naira available for the National Assembly to spend on
Constituency Projects, together with the sum of N100 billion Naira,
already provided for in the Budget, that the National Assembly should
feel it necessary to cut allocations to important national projects, and
thereby distort the Budget, in order to further increase their
allocation for Constituency projects. How much is enough!
4. The President’s position is clear from paragraph 12k of the
President’s speech, where he said “About 70 new road projects have been
inserted into the budget of the Federal Ministry of Power, Works and
Housing. In doing so, the National Assembly applied some of the
additional funds expected from the upward review of the oil price
benchmark to the Ministry’s vote. Regrettably, however, in order to make
provision for some of the new roads, the amounts allocated to some
strategic major roads have been cut by the National Assembly”.