Shocker: Senate uncoversfresh errors in 2016 budget

Nigeria’s federal lawmakers are set to remove a
whooping sum of N37 billion from the 2016
budget presented by President Muhammadu
Buhari.

The budget which has been a subject of
controversy since it submission the Senate said
it just uncovered 25 fresh errors in it.
According to reports, the items involved are
allocated about N37, 025, 238, 407 which the
Senate and House of Representatives
committees on Appropriation described about
N21,623,323,649 voted for office repairs as
avoidable.
The Nation newspaper in its report said
mistakes were made in the following eight
areas: Duplication of budget line items; Budget
items with quantities not specified; Budget
items with no location; Large amount of money
being appropriated for rehabilitation/repairs of
office /residential buildings and purchase of
office furniture and fittings; Budget items
repeated over the past four years; Curious
budget line items; Non-priority budget items;
and Wrongly classified budget items.
Recall that President Buhari recently redeployed
civil servants he claimed were responsible for
the budget padding. Some persons have
described the redeployment as a slap on the
writs of the civil servants and a shame on the
president’s anti-corruption war.
Quoting a source, the report said: “We have
identified 25 new errors in the budget involving
about N37, 025, 238, 407billion.
“From the budget, we have discovered that the
vote for the generation of 700 MW from
Zungeru hydropower project was duplicated
seven times and titled MOPWH161021632-40.
For the same project, the amounts voted are as
follows N750m, N113, 465, 000, N139, 426, 180,
N126, 624, 383, N93, 767, 500 and N160, 000,
000.