President Buhari to present N7.2trn budget for 2017

– The Federal Executive Council (FEC) has reportedly approved a N7.2trillion budget for 2017 during its meeting on Wednesday, November 30

– Budget and planning minister Senator Udoma said the MTEF which the Senate complained about was properly prepared by experts

President Buhari presenting the 2016 budget in the National Assembly

President Muhammadu Buhari has reportedly proposed a N7.2trillion budget for 2017, Daily Trust reports.

The president was said to have presented the proposed 2017 Appropriation Bill at the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting on Wednesday, November 30 during which it was approved.

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“The budget estimate that will be laid before the National Assembly for the year 2017 is N7.2 trillion. This is what FEC approved,” Daily Trust quoted a source as saying.

The approval of the budget, which is about 24 per cent higher than the 2016 budget which is N6.06 trillion, was confirmed by Minister of budget and planning Udoma Udo Udoma while briefing State House correspondents after the meeting on Wednesday.

Udoma said the president would soon present the Appropriation Bill to the National Assembly.

Udoma however disagreed with the Senate, the upper house of legislature, which said the 2017-2019 Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Fiscal Sustainability Paper submitted by President Buhari was empty.

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According to him, the MTEF was very well prepared by experienced experts and the assumptions in the document were not unrealistic as suggested by Senators.

“But the assumptions of that MTEF were assumptions which were true and correct as of the time it was prepared in August. Naturally, the estimates, every time you improve on your estimate based on the latest estimates, for instance one of the issues they raised was about the exchange rate; that we used 290 as the exchange rate, and that was the exchange rate of the time,”  he said.

Recall that the presidency confirmed that it is set to present the budget to the National Assembly on Tuesday, December 6.

The budget had been earlier expected to be presented today, December 1 but the presidency decided to move the presentation forward by five more days.

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