National Assembly raises its budget again

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26 May 2011

National Assembly raises its budget again

The National Assembly yesterday approved a federal budget cut requested by President Goodluck Jonathan, but laced the expected passage with a fresh N30 billion raise to its allocation, bringing the national budget to a new total of N4.485 trillion.

At separate meetings on Wednesday, the Senate and the House of Representatives passed the 2011 first budget amendment, aligning with Mr Jonathan's position that previously appropriated N4.97 trillion was unwieldy, and at the same time tucking new figures that may again turn out controversial after all.

The lawmakers adopted a new budget figure, N77.684 billion higher than that asked for by the executive, spreading the differential across specific subheads with the National Assembly taking the biggest share of N30 billion.

The defence ministry, is to draw the second highest amended figure with N18 billion between what the lawmakers approved yesterday and what Mr Jonathan proposed.

The National Assembly allocation, now part of statutory transfers, will be N150 billion [$ 1 billion] and not N120 billion proposed by the executive, according to the new amendment