The National Assembly on Wednesday expressed disappointment in President Bola Tinubu’s government’s poor implementation of the 2024 national budget.
The federal parliament also expressed concerns over the huge discrepancies in the size of the recurrent expenditure compared to the capital expenditure.
It described as unacceptable, the low level of fund releases for capital projects for Ministries, Departments and Agencies, (MDAs) in last year’s fiscal document still being implemented.
Chairmen of the Senate and House of Representatives Committees on Appropriation, Senator Solomon Adeola and Hon. Abubakar Birchi, made the observations at a joint sitting of the panels.
The panels held a special session with the Presidential Economic Team to consider the 2025 Appropriation Bill.
Both Adeola and Birchi agreed that the economic team should do something urgent to release more funds for capital projects.
They noted that doing so remained a major way for the people to feel the impact of government away from recurrent expenditure which affects only a negligible part of the population.
A statement by the Media Adviser to the Senate Committee Chairman, Chief Kayode Odunaro, explained that the position of the National Assembly followed the report of the economic team led by the Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Mr. Wale Edun.
The report, according to the statement, revealed that overall, so far, the 2024 budget performance was at 43 percent.
The recurrent expenditure, it stated, achieved 100 percent while the capital component of the budget only managed to achieve 25 percent performance.
Adeola, the statement explained, said he remained an advocate of drastically reducing the ratio of recurrent to capital expenditure in the budget from the present level of about 80 percent for recurrent and 20 percent for capital to at least 60 percent to 40 percent.
He stressed that the capital projects in the budget and their implementation was a major spur for economic growth and direct impact on the people.
Adeola said, “Capital releases to MDAs are the major drivers of economic activities within the nation.
“The non-release of funds for capital projects is a major issue in the performance of 2024 Budget so far and it is desirable that funds are released to prevent abandoned projects and ensure the success of the Renewed Hope Agenda of the president.”
Adeola added that it would not be good news for MDAs to come for their 2025 budget defence session with records of non-performance of their core mandates as contained in capital budget.
He added that within the period of the 2024 budget still running, effort should be made by the Finance Ministry to release funds for capital projects.
Concurring with his counterpart in the Senate, Birchi called for more releases for capital projects of MDAs for such projects as schools, roads, dams, hospitals and other social infrastructure.
He said items such as debt repayment which he argued could be restructured in the interim.
Birchi said, “Most of the items of recurrent expenditure which takes a huge part of our budget and is implemented 100 percent will only directly affect about 10 percent of our population.
“The capital projects of the MDAs on the other hand, will directly affect majority of over 200 million Nigerians in areas of social infrastructures provisions like hospitals, schools, roads, energy and similar.”
In his remarks, Edun, confirmed that they have outstanding capital releases awaiting funding.
He regretted however that the country cannot go back to the old ways of spending money not there to avoid backlash as happened in France and Germany recently, adding that there are warrants awaiting payment for capital projects.
Also throwing light on the issue, the Minister of Budget and Planning, Alhaji Abubakar Bagudu defended the huge recurrent expenditure in the nation’s budget.
He said, “It is a function of our level of development and some of the societal challenges we are facing at this moment.”
He added that some of the recurrent goes into the campaign of the military against insecurity which is yielding results to spur agricultural production and economic activities.
The Director General of Budget Office, Dr. Tanimu Yakubu, also attributed the huge recurrent expenditure to past legacies inherited by Tinubu.
He cited issues of unpaid pensions and gratuities which the administration had successfully addressed.
He assured Nigerians that in the future, there may be the need for legislation by the National Assembly to limit the size of recurrent expenditure in the budget.
The meeting, which had in attendance the Minister of State for Finance Dr. Doris Uzoka-Anite and the permanent secretaries of Ministries of Finance and Ministry of Budget and National Planning also deliberated on the issues of waivers and tax holidays which seems to reduce revenues for the government.
Sunday Aborisade
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