Reps pass N10.8trn as revised 2020 budget, approve Buhari’s $5.5bn external loan request

The House of Representatives Wednesday passed the revised 2020 Appropriation Bill, increasing the national budget from the planned N10.5 trillion to N10.8 trillion.

Earlier, the executive arm had sought to reduce the federal budget from N10.6 trillion to N10.5 trillion before the lawmakers upped it to N10.8 trillion today.

The proposed cut was premised on the global economic realities resulting from the coronavirus crisis and the crash in the prices of crude at the international oil market.

Even though the House of Representatives Committees on Appropriations and Finance, whose report was considered and adopted at Wednesday’s plenary recommended N10,801,544,664,642, the lawmakers added the sum of N4 billion for the welfare of National Association of Resident Doctors’ members who have threatened to commence strike next week.

The consideration and passage of the bill came a little after Mukhtar Betara, Chair of the House Committee on Appropriation, presented the committee report on the budget.

Based on the revised budget passed by the lower parliament, statutory transfers known as the first line of charge (the category into which the National Assembly budget belongs) was lifted from N398,505,979,362 to N422,775,979,362.

Recurrent expenditure accounts for N4.942 trillion of the entire budget sum while debt servicing for this year is expected to gulp N2.488 trillion. N2.4 trillion will go to capital expenditure.

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Femi Gbajabiamila, the Speaker, told the House that it was revealed to him during his meeting with resident doctors that the doctors planned to commence a strike next Monday.

He affirmed that he was not prepared to back any budget without it making an allocation for the implementation of the 2017 Resident Doctors Act, adding that N4 billion was required for this purpose.

“Yesterday I met with the Nigerian Association of Resident Doctors who will be going on strike on Monday. Their major issue is that the Resident Doctor Act passed in 2017 has not been implemented. We have not included them in the new budget.”

Meanwhile, the House similarly endorsed President Muhammadu Buhari’s request for a $5.5 billion external loan to fund the implementation of the 2020 budget.

The approval came after the consideration of the report of the House Committee on Loan and Debt Management by the Committee on Supply.

Ahmed Safana, Chair of the Committee on Loan and Debt Management, stated that the loan, which would be sourced from bilateral and multilateral lenders, would not increase Nigeria’s debt portfolio beyond the 25% threshold.

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