The National Assembly Joint Committee on Agricultural Production and Services has threatened zero allocation to the various agencies under the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security for failing to give an account of their 2024 budgetary allocations and projections for the 2025 fiscal year.
It was part of the decisions taken during the resumed hearing of budget defence by Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) at the National Assembly on Thursday.
The Chairman, Senate Committee on Agricultural Production and Services, Saliu Mustapha, and his House of Representatives counterpart, Bello Kaoje, expressed disappointment with the concerned heads of the agencies.
The affected heads of the agencies had spurned several directives of the joint committee to appear before the committee to defend their budget estimates. A few of them who responded had sent their subordinates to stand in for them.
Miffed by the development, the lawmakers said they would no longer attend to agencies that send officials other than their accounting officers to make presentations before them regarding their budgets.
The committee was particularly angered by the failure of the Director General of the Nigerian Agricultural Quarantine Service, Vincent Isegbe, to show up even when he was listed to brief the committee on his agency’s 2025 budget proposal on Thursday. He was mandated to appear before the committee on Monday, January 20.
Senator Mustapha reminded them of President Bola Tinubu’s directive to heads of the MDAs not to travel out of Abuja while the budget presentation and defence exercise lasted.
He noted that projections by the World Food Programme that about 33.1 million Nigerians will be hit by acute hunger in 2025 are a clear indication that food security is a task that must be accomplished.
He said, “The projection by the World Food Programme that about 33.1 million Nigerians will face food insecurity in 2025 is an indication that a food crisis is what we cannot allow to happen and we collectively need to avert.
“Given the critical role that agriculture plays in ensuring food security, economic stability, and rural development, it is important that adequate budgetary provisions be made to address the challenges the sector faces today.
“The combined effect of climate change, desertification, and other environmental challenges puts agricultural productivity under severe threat, necessitating improved budgetary allocation to the sector.”
Also, his House of Representatives counterpart, Rep. Bello Kaoje, said food security is one of the challenges facing the country today, leading to the president declaring a state of emergency on food security in 2024.
Kaoje said, “Sometime last year, Mr President declared a state of emergency on food security. We have had a robust discussion with the Minister of Agriculture, who enumerated a lot of challenges before us and we assured him that the two committees will do something to make sure that the budget is enhanced.
“We will do everything possible to ensure that where you have challenges, we can assist. We will put our heads together with the appropriation committee to make sure that the renewed hope agenda of the President is achieved in the area of food security.”