Connect with us
Advertisement

Nigeria News

#2018 Budget: Senate Gives 7day Ultimatum

Published

on

EFCC

The Senate today said the delay it is experiencing in publishing the 2018 budget is as a result of ministers and head of parastatals who have refused to provide details on their allocations to their ministries, while noting that this ministers have been given a seven day ultimatum to report the details.

The Senate President, Bukola Saraki, stressed that the upper chamber aspire to conclude the process soon, as he noted that “The perception is that it is the parliament that delays these things.”

He said “The Senate Majority Leader will communicate and get in touch with the executive arm of government, so that these MDAs can be told to play their part to ensure that this exercise can be completed”
“I appeal to all these ministers and managing directors that keep on travelling that this is a time for them to be on ground and ensure that they finish this report.”

The Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, apparently disapointed by the current situation stated that it was unfair for senators to “hold the country down.”

He added that “It has come to a stage where we have to consider taking what has already been presented by the president from those MDAs as the position of the MDAs, instead of waiting for them for ever”.

“We gave them an opportunity about three weeks ago to make this a priority but it seems that has not happened. So, instead of the country suffering, it is better to give them just few more days. And after that, the relevant committees will adopt what was sent to us by the president as the positions of the MDAs. We cannot continue to be running the country like this.”

The Senate also blamed the newly nominated acting Executive Secretary of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Anthony Okechukwu Ojukwu, ahead of a confirmation.