The House of Representatives on Tuesday said the 2018 Appropriation Bill of N9.12 trillion would be passed on Wednesday, May 16. Deputy Speaker of the House, Yusuf Lasun, who presided at plenary, made this known after the budget report was presented by the Chairman, Committee on Appropriation, Honourable Mustapha Dawaki.
The N9.12 trillion-Budget is N410 billion higher than N8.61 trillion appropriated in 2017. Lasun advised members to pick copies of the budget from the appropriation committee as the House was likely to pass the budget on Wednesday. Controversy had trailed the delay in the passage of the bill, with the National Assembly accusing Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of failing to defend their budget proposals.
The delay had prompted President Muhammadu Buhari to issue a deadline to heads of all MDAs to defend their budgets unfailingly. A breakdown of the budget indicates that N530.4 billion is for statutory transfer, N2.20 trillion for debt service and N199 billion for sinking fund for maturing loans. Also, N3.51 trillion is allocated to recurrent (non-debt) expenditure, while N2.87 trillion is earmarked for development fund for capital expenditure.
Meanwhile, the national assembly has increased the 2018 appropriation to N9.120 trillion from the N8.612 trillion presented by President Muhammadu Buhari. This is contained in the report of the National Assembly joint Committees on Appropriation just presented to members.
According to the document laid at the House on Tuesday, N530,421,368,624 was proposed for statutory transfer; N2,869,600,351,825 for development fund for capital expenditure; N3,516,477,902,077 for recurrent (non debt) expenditure; while N2,203,835,365,699 is for debt service; and N199bn as sinking fund for maturing loan.
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