NASS jacks up 2013 budget by N63bn

THE National Assembly, in separate sittings on Thursday, passed the 2013 appropriation bill of N4,987,202,425,601 as against  N4,924,604,000,000 presented by President Goodluck Jonathan.

This is coming just as the House of Representatives extended the 2012 capital budget till April 12, 2013.

The 2013 budget was increased by N62,598,435,601.

Before the passage of the budget, chairman, House Committee on Appropriation, Honourable John Enoh, had moved for the consideration of the budget estimates report, entitled “a bill for an Act to authorise the issue from the Consolidated Revenue Fund of the Federation the total sum of N4,987,202,425,601 only, of which N387,976,000,000 is for statutory transfers; N591,764,000,000 for debt service; N2,386,024,770,349 for recurrent (non debt) expenditure, while the balance of N1,621,477,655,252 is for contribution to the development fund for capital expenditure, for the year ending December 31, 2013.”

Immediately he presented the report jointly put together by Appropriation and Finance committees, the Deputy Speaker, Honourable Emeka Ihedioha, who presided over the session, asked him to give a brief explanation, but members, in unison, chorused that there was no need and pointedly told the deputy speaker to commence the consideration of the proposal in the Committee of the Whole.


In passing the 2013 budget, the House input in the bill that “...for the time being in force, all unutilised, unexecuted and unimplemented capital expenditure component of the 2012 Appropriation Act shall be rolled over and shall be construed to form part of the 2013 Appropriation Act, provided that the unutilised capital expenditure component of 2012 budget shall lapse on April 12, 2013.”

The House, however, excluded the Securities and Exchange Commission from the 2013 budget.

The House, in passing the 2013 budget, included a clause, which read: “all revenue howsoever described, including all fees received, fines, grants, budgetary provisions and all internally and externally generated revenue shall not be spent by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for recurrent or capital purposes or for any other matters, nor liabilities thereon incurred, except with prior appropriation and approval by the National Assembly.”

In the 2013 budget, there was provision of N1.4 billion for insurance of sensitive assets and National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members; N2.3 billion for entitlements of former presidents/heads of states and vice-presidents/chiefs of general staff; N2.5 billion for benefits of retired heads of the civil service of the federation and federal permanent secretaries and N50 billion for public service wage adjustment for ministries, departments and agencies (including arrears of promotion and salary increases).

Also, N66.2 billion was approved for the presidential amnesty programme; N24 billion for stipends and allowances of 30,000 Niger Delta ex-militants; N3.6 billion as operational cost; N38.4 billion for re-integration of transformed ex-militants and N546 million for re-insertion/transition safety allowance for 3,642 ex-militants (third phase).

In addition, N20 billion was approved as refund to states for federal road projects and N5.7 billion for 2011 election violence and civil disturbances (damage done to public properties and places of worship).

Meanwhile, addressing newsmen, the spokesman of the House, Honourable Zakari Mohammed, explained that zero allocation was made for SEC in the 2013 budget because of the refusal of the presidency to axe the Director-General of the commission, Ms Arumah Oteh.

He noted that the resolution of the House, which asked President Jonathan to remove Oteh as the DG of SEC remained sacrosanct, noting that “for as long as Oteh remains in office, SEC will not enjoy any parliamentary allocation of fund in the national budget.”

The spokesman, however, explained that the House decided to pass the 2013 budget “because of our concern for the welfare of the common man,” saying that the sectoral details analysis of the budget would be made public when the House reconvenes on January 16.

Also at the Senate, the approved 2013 budget was based on $79 per barrel benchmark.

 It is recalled that the budget was predicated upon some assumptions and parameters, including $79 per barrel oil benchmark, 2.53 million per barrel crude oil production, 6.5 per cent Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate, 9.5 per cent inflation rate and an exchange rate of N160 to one United States (US) dollar.


The approval was considered by the Senate after the report of its Joint Committee on Appropriation and Finance on the 2013 Appropriation was presented by its chairman, Senator Ahmad Maccido, at its plenary session.

Presenting the report, Maccido urged the executive to be more thorough in compiling the annual budget, assuring that the Senate would redouble its effort towards ensuring a realistic and workable budget for the country.

Speaking with newsmen shortly after the passage of the budget, Maccido said the executive presented it early enough and the National Assembly promptly acted on it, expressing the hope that such a spirit would be exhibited in subsequent years.

He said the budget, based on $79 oil price benchmark was reasonable, adding that “the $79 benchmark was considerable because $75 recommended by the executive was unrealistic and the $80 dollar recommended by the House of Representatives was a bit on the high side.”


The Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, who presided over the session, applauded the members of the two chambers in the National Assembly for approving the budget without any conferencing.

He said it was the first time, since 1999, when the budget would be passed before the end of the year, adding that the early passage of the bill was a vote that showed the level of maturity of the National Assembly.

Also speaking, Senator Ita Enang, who was opposed to Clause 10 during the Senate debate on the bill, explained that the president submitted along with the budget, the budget of 49 other government parastatal agencies and corporations, with the SEC being one of them.

He said the Senate would have taken a decision on SEC, like any other commission when it was considering their budgets, adding that it was not appropriate for the legislature to make a legislation that was directed at one, out of all.

He, however, said, “but the Senate, having taken this position (the passage of the budget), it has become my position, it has become the law and we are forwarding it to the president for assent and that is the decision of the Senate.”
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