Senate To Pass N895b Extra Budget Wednesday

The Senate will on Wednesday consider and pass the Federal Government’s N895.842 billion supplementary budget, it was learnt on Tuesday.

Senate President Ahmad Lawan gave this indication during plenary after the Senate Committee on Appropriation laid its report on the Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2021.

The Senate’s consideration of the request from the Executive is an indication that the extra budget would be passed tomorrow.

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Appropriations Committee Chairman Jibrin Barau had, last week, pleaded with his colleagues to allow the Joint Committees of the Senate and the House of Representatives to come up with a harmonised report on the Supplementary Bill to facilitate its eventual presentation today.

In keeping with his request for time extension, Senator Jibrin finally laid the report on the Supplementary Appropriation Bill, 2021, before the Upper Chamber yesterday.

President Muhammadu Buhari had, about two weeks ago, transmitted the Supplementary Appropriation Bill containing N895.842,465,917 billion to the National Assembly for consideration and approval.

He explained that the proposed amount would be used to fund the COVID-19 vaccine programme; fund health-related expenditures for treatment of additional 50,000 patients under the Nigeria Comprehensive AIDS Programme in the states; and for procurement of additional equipment captured in this year’s capital expenditure on Defence and Security to tackle prevalent security challenges across the country.