…it’s out of place for lawmakers to go cap in hand to MDAs to beg for projects insertion
…we’ve denied ourselves of owning the budget
A top ranking member of the House of Representatives, Hon Tajudeen Yusuf on Thursday said Nigerian lawmakers have ceded their rights to budgetary processes as worldwide, the budget is strictly the property of the parliament.
TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports Hon Yusuf reacting to President Muhammadu Buhari’s presentation on Thursday saying the budgetary processes is no longer in the hands of lawmakers who originally own the budget.
Yusuf in an exclusive chat with TNG explained that”the vogue now is for our colleagues to move from one agency to the other asking for insertion of projects when it ought to be the other way round.
“The norm is for government agencies to approach lawmakers on projects that should be included in the Appropriation Bill but the reverse is the case now.
“We have never been able to assert ourselves, it has never been this bad. National Assembly leaders have become takers of proposals rather than being the owners of Appropriation bill.
“People go to budget office to lobby, members go to lobby before budget comes, leadership goes to lobby and put things there before budget comes, that is where we are now.
“What is supposed to be your own, your right to add to subtract, you go to those who are making proposals to you and go and lobby to put things in, so you have ceded your rights to them and this is a fact, everybody goes to lobby.
Reacting to a question weather lawmakers really lobby, he said: ” Yes, before it gets to National Assembly. That is why we have our budgets of N16trillion and we are borrowing over N7trillion.
” Capital is 20%, servicing of debts, the debts that this government borrowed, can be matched to the projects as Consultancy, legal fees take all the loan.
“Since 2015 we have funded frontier exploration for them to do feasibility studies, we borrow to do feasibility studies. In Niger Delta, companies go to do feasibility study, look for oil, explore for oil, find the oil and Nigeria will now join to share but the so called frontier areas will carry government money to go and do those things.
“Niger Delta that owns oil, we are not investing in them, we are investing in a mirage, we are using loan to do that”.