The 2025 budget proposal to the National Assembly by President Bola Tinubu may overshoot the N49.7tr mark by the time the appropriation bill is eventually passed.
Indications emerging from budget defence sessions by Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) before the various committees of the National Assembly showed tendencies to increase the budget far above what President Tinubu proposed.
In the ongoing budget defence sessions, representatives of the various MDAs are told to increase allocations made for their MDAs in the original proposal.
In some instances, agencies are told to either increase their allocations or present fresh proposals for lawmakers to consider.
The budget defence sessions are being held by joint committees of the Senate and House of Representatives to speed up the process.
Some of the agencies being pressured to increase their allocations have argued that there was no need for such an increase because they don’t have structures in place to absorb the added expenses.
One such instance was the rejection of the budget proposal of N8.9bn for the Federal Ministry of Information and National Orientation for being “grossly inadequate.”
The Joint Senate and House Committees on Information and National Orientation, which rejected the budget proposal, also summoned the Minister for Budget and Economic Planning, Atiku Bagudu, to explain why the ministry’s budget was that low.
The committee, chaired by Senator Kenneth Eze, wanted a bigger budget envelope for the ministry.
Similarly, the N11.8bn budget proposal for the newly created Ministry of Livestock Development was turned down by the lawmakers for being too meagre.
The livestock minister, Mr Idi Maiha, during the budget defence session last week, told the lawmakers that N10 million was for capital expenditure while the remaining N1.8bn was for recurrent.
But the lawmakers would have not of it, demanding that the budget for the ministry be increased.
Explanations by the Minister to the effect that the new ministry did not have the required structures on the ground to absorb a bigger budget fell on deaf ears.
The Minister further explained that the ministry’s take-off process was still ongoing with formative departments from the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security from which the new ministry was carved out.
Maiha also told the lawmakers that his ministry was yet to have office accommodation and lacked the necessary facilities and operational equipment to run as a full-fledged ministry.
According to him, the ministry is currently being accommodated by the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF).
The Minister said though the N11.8bn budget might be small, it was enough to provide a roadmap to get the ministry take-off effectively.
However, the lawmakers asked the minister to harmonise adequate financial needs and represent additional requests for funding in the form of a supplementary budget.
Chairmen of the joint committee, Senator Musa Mustapha and Rep Wale Raji, insisted that the minister should present a supplementary budget, promising “prompt approval.”
Wale Raji queried the amount of input from the Presidential Implementation Committee for the take-off of the ministry.
“There will be a need for you to make a special presentation on this or come up with a supplementary budget that will reflect the hope of Nigerians.
“The budget is abysmally low to respond to the yearnings of Nigerians,” he said.
The Senate Chairman, Sen. Musa Mustapha, said the committee will try its best to “help the ministry achieve its mandate.”
However, the Minister of Budget Planning, Atiku Bagudu, and the Director General of the Budget Office, Tanimu Yakubu, have been consistent in their claims that there were no such funds to increase the proposed budget figures as it’s being demanded by the lawmakers.