President of the Senate, Senator Ahmad Lawan on Thursday said that 200 revenue generating government owned bodies are grossly inefficient.
The Senate president made this revelation at the ongoing 2021 budget presentation by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Lawan also vowed that the National Assembly will be very thorough in “our jobs as we ensure that the January to December budget cycle is achieved.
More details soon…
President of the Senate Ahmad Lawan has vowed that the National Assembly will pass the 2021 Budget on time to sustain the January to December budget cycle.
TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports the Senator Lawan made the vow on Thursday as President Muhammadu Buhari presents the 2021 Budget estimates to the NASS.
Lawan recalled that the presentation of the 2020 budget around this time last year and his promise to return to the Jan-Dec budget cycle.
He thanked members of the NASS for fulfilling that promise by working assiduously towards achieving that promise and said that same vigor would be applied to the 2021 Appropriation Bill.
Details shortly…
Ahead of today’s budget presentation by President Muhammadu Buhari, presidential security operatives have taken over security apparatus of the National Assembly (NASS) complex.
TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports that in a bid to ensure there are no security hitches during the presentation, presidential security operatives on Thursday took over NASS security apparatuses.
TNG noticed that the four major entry points into the complex was taken over by mobile police men and DSS operatives from the Presidential Villa.
Buhari is expected to arrive the venue by 11 am today to present the 2021 budget of N13.3 trillion as against that of 2020 that was N10.3 trillion.
Last year’s budget presentation was hitch free unlike that of 2018 that the opposition ensured the president had problems presenting his budget speech.
On Monday and Tuesday, the executive and the legislature had a retreat in preparation for the budget presentation today.
Barely 24 hours to the presentation of the 2021 budget by President Muhammadu Buhari, some lawmakers in the National Assembly (NASS) have described the proposed budget as a recipe for corruption.
The lawmakers who are mainly in the opposition told TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) that there is no need going too far that merely looking at the deliverables of 2020 budget, Nigerians do not need a soothsayer to tell them that this is another empty one.
Recall that the 2020 budget of N10.3trillion was highly in deficit because of the COVID-19 pandemic and other extraneous factors.
Evaluating its performance so far calls for a lot of reasoning as it performed far below 35 percent, the lawmakers said.
The lawmakers who spoke under the condition of anonymity said where on Earth will N13.3 trn emerge from to fund the 2021 budget. So the bottom line is that this budget is going to be tailored properly into corruption.
A lawmaker from the North Central geo-political zone told TNG that “well we all know that the funds are not picked on the streets, the last budget is still having funding problems then suddenly you are bringing another N13.3 trn to be funded from where,” he queried.
Another Lawmaker from the South-West zone equally spoke in the same vein, saying “it’s most awkward because we do know that the Nigerian economy is deeply in crisis maybe we’ll fund this 2021 budget with borrowed funds.
“Well, we are watching from the sidelines the expected abracadabra that this administration is fond of performing at critical periods like this”.
President Muhammadu Buhari will present the 2021 Appropriations Bill, being Nigeria’s 2021 Budget proposal before the National Assembly (NASS) on Thursday, 8th October, 2020.
TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports this is contained in an executive communication read by Senate President Ahmad Lawan on the floor of the Senate during the plenary session of Tuesday.
Recall the Federal Executive Council (FEC) had approved N13.08 trillion budget proposal for 2021 fiscal year, with the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs Zainab Ahmed revealing the budget estimate was made up of N2.083 trillion capital expenditure, which she described as 29 per cent of the total budget.
According to her, the budget proposal is predicated on N379/$ exchange rate, oil benchmark of $40 per barrel, oil production volume of 1.86 million barrels per day, including 400,000 condensate, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth of three per cent and 11.95 per cent inflation rate.
Meanwhile, Lawan had upon resumption of Senate plenary after a two-month annual vacation last Tuesday hinted that the 2021 Budget would be passed in the early week of December “so that it can be transmitted to the President for his assent before the end of 2020”.
The Federal Executive Council (FEC) has projected a N13.08 trillion budget for 2021.
Disclosing this to State House Correspondents after the weekly virtual FEC meeting presided over by President Muhammadu Buhari, the Minister for Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, also said the oil benchmark has been pegged at $40 per barrel.
The Minister, who was accompanied by the Minister of State for Budget and National Planning Clement Agba; the Minister for Information and Culture Alhaji Lai Mohammed; and Director-General of the Budget Office, Ben Akabueze, also said the projected capital expenditure for the year is projected at N2.083 trillion.
Other indices projected to tune the 2021 budget include oil production at 1.86 million barrels per day, including 400,000 barrels of condensate; Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth target at 3%; inflation target at 11.95%; and foreign exchange set at N379 to one dollar.
The Minister further informed the 2021 budget has a N7.89 trillion revenue projection with a N4.489 trillion fiscal deficit on the proposed N13.08 trillion budget.
She said her Ministry also reported the performance of the 2020 Budget from the beginning to July, to the Council, stating that the revenue performance was at 68% while expenditure stood at 92.3%, as at July of this year.
Speaking about targets of the 2021 proposed budget, Ahmed said the administration hoped to use the projections to stimulate the economy, create jobs and infrastructure, among other economic goals.
“We have total aggregate revenue of N7.89 trillion and also an aggregate expenditure of N13.08 trillion for 2021.
“There’s a fiscal deficit of N4.489 trillion, this represents 3.64%, slightly above what is required by the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 3% and also to report that the total capital expenditure that is projected in the Budget is 29% of the aggregate expenditure.
“This is an improvement over the 24% that we had in the 2020 Budget, but slightly below the 30% that we targeted in the economic recovery.
“Just to clarify that the 1.86 million barrels per day crude oil production includes 400,000 condensate, so we have complied with the OPEC quota, which is placed at about 1.5 million barrels per day. So the 1.46 is in meeting with the OPEC quota.
“This is important to us because as you report, if you just report the 1.86, some members of the OPEC appear to think that we are exceeding OPEC quota, whereas we are reporting oil and condensate,” she said.
President Muhammadu Buhari will present the 2021 budget to the joint session of the National Assembly next week.
The senate just resumed from their recess and has immediately swung into action.
The upper chamber had been on recess since July, 2020.
According to Lawan, the president would present his budget next week for quick passage of the appropriation bill into law.
In 2019, the 9th Senate made history for quick passage of the appropriation bill into law without allowing it to drag into 2020.
The Federal Government has projected N12,658,009,802,283.00 as 2021 budget estimate.
The government also projected N5.16trillion as budget deficit for 2021 up from N4.98trillion in the 2020 budget.
This is contained in the Medium Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper (MTEF/FSP) submitted to the Senate by President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday.
The Federal Government also pegged the 2021 oil benchmark at $40 per barrel and an exchange rate of N360 to a dollar.
According to the document, the statutory transfers stand at N481billion, Debt Service is N3.124trillion, sinking fund of N220billion and recurrent expenditure of N5.7trillion.
The Federal Government also proposed a capital expenditure of N3.33trillion.
The Government also projected Stamp Duty to earn the country N500billion up from N200billion in 2020.
The Government noted of the 2021 budgeted expenditure, debt service is estimated at N3.124 trillion and provision for sinking fund to retire maturing bonds issued to local contractors/creditors is NN220billion.
A total of N4.31 trillion is provided for personnel and pension costs, an increase of N724.67billion over 2020.
Personnel Costs, it said, have continued to rise yearly, in great part due to unrestrained recruitment by several agencies of government, oftentimes without compliance with the due process.
The Government warned that at 70 per cent of projected revenues for 2021, this level of personnel cost is not sustainable.
It noted that having made these provisions, the aggregate amount available for capital expenditure in the 2021 budget is N3.33trillion which represents 26.3 per cent of total expenditure and it is 24 per cent higher than the 2020 provision of N2.69trillion.
The Government also projected an oil production of 1.88million barrels per day for 2021 up from 1.80mbpd in the 2020 budget.
On budget deficit, which the government projected to be N5.16trillion in 2021, it noted: “This represents 3.62 per cent of estimated GDP, well above the threshold of 3 per cent stipulated in the Fiscal Responsibility Act 2007.
“Unless we can find new revenue sources, given the limited scope for cost-cutting, it will not be feasible to keep budget deficits within the 3% target set in FRA 2007.”