N’Assembly Postpones N20.51trn 2023 Budget Passage over Errors in Fiscal Document

Sunday Aborisade and Udora Orizu in  Abuja

The final consideration and passage of the N20.51 trillion 2023 appropriation bill suffered a setback in both Senate and House of Representatives yesterday.
The leadership of both chambers blamed the obstruction on alleged inherent problems created by the executive arm of government.
President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, said there were irreconcilable figures detected by the appropriations committees of both chambers in the fiscal document.

Lawan, however, said the problematic areas were sorted out on Wednesday with relevant government functionaries from the executive arm of government.
He said as a result of the long cleaning process the draft budget proposal underwent, Committees on Appropriations from both chambers could not meet up with submission of the report for consideration and passage yesterday.

Both chambers, he added, agreed to have special sessions next Wednesday for consideration and passage of the proposed budget and other important bills, like the 2022 Finance bill, the N819.5billion 2022 supplementary budget, among others.

Lawan said, “Today was scheduled for us to receive and consider the report of our Committee on Appropriation for the 2023 Appropriation Bill.
“However, due to some challenges, we are not able to receive the report of the committee, and the main reason is that the Appropriation Bill came to the National Assembly with some problems and when our Committees on Appropriation in the Senate and the House of Representatives started to reconcile the figures of what we have done and what was presented, the problems became very obvious and they were not easy to deal with, and, therefore, our committees had to start a process of cleaning up the bill first.

“That process, of course, also engaged the executive arm because the problems came from there. It was concluded only yesterday (Wednesday), and our committee secretariats are not able to finish processing the budget for us to take today nor tomorrow, nor Saturday nor Sunday because these are periods that are for festivities, Christmas period. Monday, Tuesday are public holidays.

“Consequently, we can only receive the report and consider it on Wednesday, the 28th December, 2022.  That is the earliest, that’s next week.
“So far, this ninth National Assembly has done so much to pass the previous appropriation bills since 2019 before the end of the year to date and I’m sure that this would remain one of the cherished legacies of the ninth National Assembly.
“So, by the Grace of God, on the 28th of this month, the Senate and, indeed, the House of Representatives will all come back to receive and consider the budget report from our committees.

“Secondly, our Committee on Finance is this morning holding a public hearing on the Finance Bill 2022, and, of course, the Finance Bill is the basis on which the Appropriation Bill 2023 is built.
“We had arranged yesterday that the Finance Committee will present a report of the Finance Bill Hearing at 2pm today (Thursday)
“That, of course, would not be possible. This is the reason: we also received two communications yesterday (Wednesday) Supplementary Budget 2022 and, of course, Ways and Means.

“So our committees on Appropriation, Finance, Water Resources, Agriculture and Works and Housing will be processing the bills for today.”
Speaking further, the senate president said, “In that respect, the Senate will adjourn immediately so that our committees start the action they are supposed to take and, therefore, those reports will also be available to us on 28th December when we will be here.

“And, by the Grace of God, Wednesday, the 28th December, 2022, will be a very heavily loaded day for us, but I’m sure we will be able to deal with all the issues that Wednesday and our colleagues who would wish to travel back to continue the festivities with their families can still make it the following day.
“I want to thank all of you, my distinguished colleagues, for your support, cooperation, commitment, dedication on all these things that we have been doing as a legislature.

“Let me advise the executive. The bills that have come to us, the Ways and Means, the Supplementary Appropriation, whoever is invited to come and explain, to give information or any details for the National Assembly to understand must do so, because it’s not our work alone.
“We want to do our work thoroughly, we want to understand whatever we are going to deal with and to base our decisions on information, and time is of essence.

“Just like we are going to sacrifice part of our festive period to be back here, nobody should tell us that they are in their places because it is Christmas. They should be available with every necessary information.”