SAN FRANCISCO, June 26, (THEWILL) – The Minister of Power, Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, has insisted that said the National Assembly’s response to his observation on the 2017 Budget did not address fundamental issues raised on funds allocated to key ministries.
THEWILL recalls that Fashola had expressed displeasure at the editing of the allocation for his ministry as he alleged that other items were inserted by the legislators. Irked by his statements, the legislators responded insisting that fashola was not in sync with realities of federalism stating that it only tried to balance the projects to include diverse regions in the country.
Unsatisfied by the response, Fashola, in a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Media, Hakeem Bello, said he was worried that spokespersons of the Senate and House of Representatives failed to state the reason the National Assembly cut allocations to key infrastructure projects of the ministry.
While acknowledging that legislators could contribute to budget making, Fashola disagreed that members of the legislative arm have powers to alter items in the budget after putting the executive members through defence sessions and committee hearings insisting that the legislators lack power to insert items into the budget as prepared by the executive.
He observed that it amounts to abuse and disregard for law for lawmakers to unilaterally insert items not contained in the original documents submitted by the executive as he expressed concern over the recourse to name-calling and personal attack by the federal lawmakers.
“I acknowledge the need for legislators to make input in budget process as representatives of the people, but it amounts to a waste of tax payers money and an unnecessary distortion for lawmakers to unilaterally insert items not under the exclusive or concurrent lists of the Constitution, such as boreholes and streetlights after putting Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) through the process of budget defence,” the statement read.
“It is sad that the lawmakers resorted to name-calling even without understanding what they were getting into. Let us take the projects, which the lawmakers chose to focus on, one after the other.
“I want the public to know there is no subsisting concession agreement on the Lagos–Ibadan Expressway. What the Infrastructure Construction Regulatory Commission (ICRC) has is a financing agreement from a consortium of banks, which is like a loan that still has to be paid back through budgetary provisions.
“In the case of the Second Niger Bridge, which the NASS spokespersons alleged that the provision in 2016 budget was not spent and had to be returned, it is display of worrisome gaps in knowledge by the spokespersons about the budget process.
“The lawmakers must know that a budget is not cash; it is an approval of estimates of expenditure to be financed by cash from the Ministry of Finance.”
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