Echoes Of Budgetary Negligence By: Augustine Omilo
With the passage into law of the 2025 appropriation bill by the National Assembly, Nigeria is set to commence the implementation of her financial plans for the year. As it were, national budget offers a template from where citizens, states and organizations derive their level of stake holding in a nation’s scheme of things.
Even though the country’s current budget appears good enough to address many of the economic challenges facing her, there are elements therein that makes the policy guideline look discriminatory. For example, it took the careful of observation of Hon. Chinedu Ogar representing Ikwo/Ezza federal constituency of Ebonyi state for NASS members to notice that the entire South East geopolitical zone was not included in the Nigeria’s plan for rail transport system which was allocated N41.48bn in this year’s budget.
While acknowledging the legislator’s concern, the speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Tajudeen Abass merely assured him that the perceived omission would be addressed in subsequent supplementary budgets. This is an error. It is not correct to assume that budgets will always be followed by supplementary ones. Rather, additional financial plans for one year occur mostly as a result of planners’ inability to accurately assemble indices that help to draft a faultless budget that can accommodate a nation or organisation’s economic activities for the entire year in question.
It therefore follows that if the 2025 budget runs through without a need for a supplementary one, Hon. Tajudeen Abass’ promise to Ogar and his region will end up as statement akin to that given to baby just to stop him from crying over denial to suck his mother’s breast.
The federal government has established what she terms ‘development commission’ for each of the nation’s six geopolitical zones. While the south east, south-south, south-west and north central got N140bn each for their activities for 2025, North West and North East received N145bn and N241b respectively. No explanations are yet available for this imbalance. If the effects of insecurity finally emerge as the yardstick for the financial allocation to these zonal agencies, the North central, south west and the south east have been substantially affected by the same scourge. Ebonyi state recently experienced mass killings of her citizens as a result an alleged killing of Fulani herders’ cows. And human killings and destruction of properties have become the order of the day in Benue state.
There is hardly any Nigerian who does not believe that the citizens need to have ‘reconstructed’ mindset towards how life was intended to be lived by humans before real positive changes can begin to take place in the country. It is only logical to believe that it is the national orientation agency that has the mandate to drive this all-important change.
Unfortunately, the Ministry of information and orientation saddled with the responsibility of informing the public about the happenings in government and carrying out the crusade for mindset reprogramming for Nigerians towards positive attitudes on how mankind was originally created to relate with God and man received a paltry sum of N75.88bn. The ministry of external affairs, whose functions are fast becoming undertaken by the presidency on the other hand, got the sum of N286.89bn for the same expenditure period.’
SEE ALSO: NIGERIA’S OTHER COLLAPSING ‘GRIDS’ By Augustine Omilo
In the budget, the National Assembly approved the sum of N344B for itself. This amount almost equals that which was approved for the south east, south-south and south-west development commissions put together. Then, the question arises; “what are the reasons for the humongous provisions for the law makers? This question becomes pertinent because less than two years ago, they all got cars worth about N160m each. Their offices were renovated within the same period. Apart from a few of them like Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, representing Kogi West Senatorial district, there have not been many records of constituency projects executed by these fellows.
Ordinarily, it may not be necessary to dwell on how budgets can be used to foster unity and togetherness among Nigerian citizens and her different components. After all, perceived imbalances may not be intentional. But unfortunately, negligence and marginalization are the parents of tribalism. And of course, tribalism gives birth to resentment which remains the mother of all forms agitations in the country, including the clamour for separate countries by some folks. It therefore behooves the federal government to use every known unity instruments within her reach, especially the budget to begin to address all issues that open the country’s togetherness to serious contentions.
As the saying goes; “it is better late than never”. This is why Hon. Tajudeen Abass’ promise on behalf of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to address Hon. Ogar’s fears must not be treated with levity. As the countries of the world are responding in different ways to the policies of the President of America, Donald Trump, Nigeria can only follow suit appropriately with a united socio-political force, using the budget as a stepping stone.