President Bola Tinubu has presented a supplementary budget to the National Assembly in the amount of N2.177 trillion, and the House of Representatives will soon vote on the report of the Committee on Appropriations.
On Thursday’s order paper, the committee is scheduled to be discussed in committee. The House will return to plenary to vote on the supplemental budget when the consideration period concludes.
On Wednesday, ministers and leaders of security services testified in front of lawmakers as part of the Appropriations Committee’s budget defence session.
Jerrymusa.com reports that at the budget defence session, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Abubakar Bichi remarked that the Supplementary Appropriations Bill is designed to fix problems with things like security, roads, and the housing shortage.
“Also support the provisional wage for workers and cash transfers to vulnerable Nigerians,” Bichi said of the additional budget. The next off-cycle elections in Kogi, Bayelsa, and Imo States will also benefit from this.
He broke down the proposed budget for the Ministry of Defence, which totals N476,543,847,421, as N215,937,945,659 in operating expenses and N260,605,901,762 in capital outlays. The projected N200 billion for the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security includes N104.800 billion for recurrent expenditures and N95.200 billion for capital expenditures.
For the police, the sum of N29,661,660,269 is for recurrent spending, while the sum of N20,338,339,731 is for capital expenditure. Also, out of the total projected amount of N29,700,606,916, N27,402,410,057 is for recurrent spending and N2,298,196,859 is for capital expenditure at the Office of the National Security Adviser.
He said, “We’ve asked the appropriate MDAs to explain and defend their claims.” We will compile our findings into a report and submit it to the House upon completion of the hearing.