President Muhammadu Buhari may present the N6.04 trillion 2016 budget to the National Assembly next week Tuesday, BusinessDay has learnt.
At an executive session that lasted over an hour before the commencement of sitting, senators debated the matter and resolved that it would be ready to receive the President next week Tuesday.
Accordingly, the Senate decided to defer its Christmas/New Year holiday, which had earlier been scheduled to commence on Thursday.
A source in the National Assembly however stated that most senators had preferred the budget session to be fixed for Friday to allow them travel.
He said the choice of Tuesday was arrived at after considering the fact that Friday was too short a day being a half working day to conduct such an assignment.
The Senate is also expected to approve the Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) this week. The Federal Executive Council (FEC) at an emergency meeting last week approved the MTEF in preparation for the presentation of the 2016 budget.
The meeting, which was presided over by President Buhari, proposed an all-time high expenditure of N6.04 trillion for 2016. It also pegged the crude oil price benchmark at an all-time low of $38 per barrel.
The N6 trillion-expenditure profile is the highest in the history of the country. It was N4.07 trillion in 2010, N4.22 trillion in 2011; N4.74 trillion in 2012, N4.92 trillion in 2013, N4.6 trillion in 2014 and N5.06 trillion in the current year (including the N574.5bn approved as supplementary budget).
On the other hand, the crude oil benchmark at $38 per barrel is the lowest price used in recent times. It was $62 per barrel in 2011, $67 in 2012, $79 in 2013, $76 in 2014 and $53 per barrel in the current year.
Source - https://businessdayonline.com/2015/12/buhari-presents-n6-4trn-budget-to-national-assembly-next-week/
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