Why I Made Changes To 2016 Budget – Buhari Finally Explains

The president of Nigeria has cleared the air on the
controversy generated by the missing budget as he
explains why he was forced to make corrections to the
budged after the earlier submission.
President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday gave reasons
why he made corrections to the 2016 Budget he had
earlier submitted to the joint National Assembly after
controversy emerged that the budget had been altered.
Explaining his reasons, the president wrote in a letter to
the House of Representatives as read by the Speaker,
Yakubu Dogara in Abuja.
The letter reads in part: “It will be recalled that on
Tuesday, 22 December, 2015, I presented my 2016 budget
proposals to the joint sitting of the National Assembly.
“I submitted a draft bill accompanied by a schedule of
details.
“At the time of submission, we indicated that because
the details had just been produced, we would have to
check to ensure that there were no errors in the
detailed breakdown contained in the schedule.
“That has since been completed and I understand that
the corrections have been submitted.
“The National Assembly would therefore have the
details as submitted on the 22nd and a copy containing
the corrections submitted last week. It appears that this
has led to some confusion.
“In this regard, please find attached the corrected
version.
“This is the version the National Assembly should work
with as my 2016 budget estimates.
“The draft bill remains the same and there are no
changes in any of the figures.”
However, the letter didn’t go down well with some People
Democratic Party members. Raising a point of order
citing Sections 81 and 84 of the 1999 constitution (as
amended), Rep. Leo Ogor (Delta-PDP), the Minority
Leader of the House said that the provisions of the law
did not give the president powers to amend budget,
adding that such powers lie with the legislature. He thus
urged the house to discard the letter.
The speaker however cleared the matter as he insisted
that the budget was not amended but only corrected. He
said that it is only the president that has powers to make
corrections to the budget if he observes any error.
That didn’t go down well with PDP lawmakers who
shouted a resounding “no, no!”. At the end, the speaker
won the day.