The 2016 budget has been rejected by the Senate yesterday as a result of certain discovery of strange projects which surfaced in the second version presented to the National Assembly by the Presidency.
According to Mohammed Ali Ndume, the Senate Majority leader in a briefing with journalists at the National assembly, the Majority leader stated that the documents failed integrity tests carried out on the 2016 budget by the Senate.
Also, he further confirmed that Dr. Abubakar Bukola Saraki, the Senate President would disclose the contents of the letter forwarded to the Upper legislative chamber by the President, Muhammad Buhari although he failed to disclose the content of the said letter.
It is important to note that the Senate on Thursday rejected the replacement provided for the original version of the Budget submitted to it by the President with the Senate President announcing the decision of the House.
Saraki said “We have received the report of the Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions on investigations surrounding 2016 Appropriation Bill. Our finding is that the Senior Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly Matters (Senate) Senator Ita Enang, printed copies of the 2016 Appropriation Bill and brought to the Senate”
He added that the version received was different from the previous version presented by the President stating that the house has decided to consider the version originally presented by the President.
Senate President, Saraki also explained the grounds on which the second budget contradicted the originally submitted version stating that both documents were compared and it was found that some projections which were not included in the documentation of the original copy earlier submitted by the President had been smuggled into the new document to cater for certain hidden interests.
He also added: “As at present, there are two documents and they are before the Senate. We are telling you now that we are taking the first one; we left the second one because we think it’s not good for Nigeria.”
The crisis arising as a result of questioned integrity, trustworthiness and hidden interests vested in the documents might delay the original plans of the Senate to pass the budget before the end of February.