‘Missing’ 2016 Budget Documents: Senate Awaits Probe Report. - Suspects Presidency

What really is the fate of the 2016 budget document? Did it suddenly develop wings and fly into thin air? These and more are the questions on the lips of Nigerians.

 

The Senate held an urgent session over the alleged “disappearance” of the hard copies of the budget proposal submitted to a joint session of the National Assembly on December 22, last year.

 

The missing Budget had become an urgent issue of public importance. The senators who were said to have been troubled mandated a committe to investigate the controversy surrounding the “missing” 2016 budget  and to submit its report on Thursday(tomorrow)

 

The committee was set up at an closed-door session of the Senate on Tuesday when the matter was discussed.

 

The Senate President, Bukola Saraki (APC-Kwara State), said the Senate would wait for the ad hoc committee to look into the matter and submit its report on Thursday.

 

The Senate also announced it would debate the 2016 budget from Tuesday, and that lawmakers would receive copies of the document by Thursday.

 

The upper lawmaking body is expected to produce new copies of the budget, after senators told the media on Tuesday that copies handed over by President Muhammadu Buhari had surprisingly disappeared.

 

Senators said they suspected the presidency secretly withdrew the documents for some modification, a claim the presidency denied. However, officials well briefed on the matter told Newsmen that both the leadership of the National Assembly and the presidency, as well as Ministry of Finance and the Budget Office, were working to discreetly change certain parameters of the budget proposal following the slide in the global oil price.

 

Meanwhile, while the senate awaits the conclusion of its investigation, Yakubu Dogara, the speaker of the House of Representatives on Wednesday(today) displayed a copy of the budget during the house’s sitting, saying the budget was not missing.

Mr. Dogara said the report of the missing budget was an “April fool”.  April Fool indeed. We sha dey January and there is no smoke without fire. We hope the senate committee's report would have someone account to Nigerian what truly happened.