NASS slams Presidency over failure to sign budget

The National Assembly, NASS, declared, yesterday, that the Presidency would be ungrateful for the good job it did on the 2016 Appropriation Bill passed into law, last week, if President Muhammadu Buhari actually said he would not sign the document unless it was accompanied by the details.

NASS regretted that the Presidency failed to appreciate the herculean task it faced to pass the budget, despite the errors contained in the different versions of the document submitted to the legislature and the litany of disapproval by some ministers.

But the Presidency through its Senior Special Assistant on National Assembly Matters (House of Representatives), Suleiman Abdulrahman Kawu, insisted that until the budget details were submitted for scrutiny, it would not be assented to by the President.

 It was, however, drama in the office of Chairman, Senate Committee on Appropriation, Senator Danjuma Goje, as he drove away journalists who were there to seek clarification on the budget controversy. 

Addressing journalists in Abuja, yesterday, Chairman, House Committee on Appropriation, Dr. Abdulmumin Jibrin, said the President was at liberty to assent to the budget or refuse to do so. Jibrin said he was sure that the statement did not emanate from the Presidency as former President Olusegun Obasanjo assented to the budget during his administration without the details. 

He, however, assured that details of the budget would be made available to the Presidency within the next two weeks, insisting that from the side of the National Assembly, the budget had been passed.

Vanguard