March 17, (THEWILL)- Like a broken record that offends but continues to play because no step is taken to end it, budget padding has become a recurring decimal in Nigeria’s budgetary process.
As a terminology, it gained national prominence in 2016. That year, what obviously had been a known practice by senior lawmakers and the executive, attained a legal status and national embarrassment.
That was the year the word ‘padding’ was defined and it has since stuck with the entrenched budgetary process whereby billions of naira are illegally siphoned from the system through inflation of budgetary allocations.
That year, Hon. Abdulmumin Jibrin was Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Appropriation. Sacked for daring to raise an eyebrow over monetary allocations that had no attached infrastructure, he went to spill the beans. He disclosed that what is often described as “insertion” had been part and parcel of the budget process in Nigeria, noting though that the degree varies.”
He said, “Every year, there has always been that (insertions) and if you can recall properly, in the five years that I have spent in the National Assembly, there were key issues that created a bit of tension between the National Assembly and the Executive arm of government.
“Essentially, one is the size of the budget and second is the quantity of the insertions; new items from the National Assembly. This issue always causes friction between both arms of government. It was the case in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and of course 2016. The only difference is the insertions in 2016. I saw a lot of insertions in 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 and 2015 and in 2016, it went completely off the board.”
It not only went off the board, it went to the court for adjudication after a two-week prolonged public uproar.
A Federal High Court sitting in Lagos in a landmark judgement had ordered President Muhammadu Buhari to, “urgently instruct security and anti-corruption agencies to forward to him reports of their investigations into allegations of padding and stealing of some N481 billion from the 2016 budget by some principal officers of the National Assembly.”
In the suit brought before Justice Mohammed Idris by Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), the court directed President Muhammadu Buhari to, “order the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, SNCN, and /or appropriate anti-corruption agencies to without delay commence prosecution of indicted lawmakers.”
The court also ordered Buhari to “direct the publication of the report of investigations by security and anti-corruption bodies into the alleged padding of the 2016 budget.”
As it turned out that year, reports had it that trouble started at the National Assembly when it was ‘discovered’ that N40 billion was allegedly set aside for the 10 principal officers of the Senate and House of Representatives, while the balance of N60 billion would be shared among the 109 Senators and 360 House members for the implementation of the Zonal Intervention Projects.
The long and short of the 2016 saga was that none of the legislators was identified and prosecuted by the Muhammadu Buhari Administration.
Eight years later, a similar scenario is playing out with Senator Abdul Ningi and the National Assembly. His allegation of budget padding to the tune of N3trn has led to his suspension, resignation as Chairman of Northern Senators Forum and the unveiling of more can of worms, despite an explanation and clarification by the leadership of the National Assembly, Minister of Budget and Economic Planning, Abubakar Badaru, said that the alleged padding was a false alarm.
Just like Hon Jibrin who was suspended in 2016, Senator Ningi who had been suspended for three months for insisting that the N3trn was untraceable, continues to maintain that his disclosure is yet to be addressed.
“Have they asked me since the so-called crisis, where are your findings? Where are your documents? I am not using my head to come up with figures. Nobody has talked to me about evidence. Nobody has suggested even listening to me. All they are trying to do is to ensure that Ningi is silenced or arrested so that he does not do anything. I have opened the can of worms. Neither they nor I will be able to control it.”
At any rate, hardly had Ningi’s allegation settled down than another ‘padding’ of the sum of N6.6 trillion was traced to 20 ministries for “unknown projects last weekend.”
According to Microxpressions Consult in its “Final Summary Analysis of Harmonized 2024 Budget (Passed)”, which it submitted to the National Assembly, “N6,671, 810,092, 564 out of the N8,447,888,443,379, representing 71 per cent of the total ‘Development Capital Allocation was “assigned to initiatives that are elusive.”
It went on to say that an additional N4,185,711,477,842 was earmarked for projects that lack specific geographic identifiers, thus complicating the traceability and accountability process.
Meanwhile, Co-founder and CEO of BudgIT, Seun Onigbinde, last Wednesday backed Senator Ningi’s claims that over N3 trillion was allocated in the 2024 budget without the details or expenditure on the items for which the allocation was provided.
Although he agreed with Senator Ningi that there should be a detailed breakdown of the budget, he however disagrees with him that the government is running two different budgets.
But Minister of Budget, Bagudu said there was no cause for alarm. Like the Senate spokesperson, Senator Yemi Adaramola, who said there was nothing like budget padding as far as the Senate was concerned, Bagudu said that the new insertions did not violate any law and it has been so since 1999 because what the President presented to the National Assembly was a bill, but the budget passed with modifications was an act of the National Assembly. The President presented a budget to the tune of N27.5 trillion and the National Assembly increased it to N28.7 trillion.
The National Assembly has the power to do as it likes with the budget.
“There is no Supreme Court judgement and the choice of democracy is that the National Assembly has the last word. Even when they pass an appropriation that assent is refused, after 30 days, it becomes law. Do they have the right to increase a budget line? I will say yes.”
But for the civil society and politicians, the last word is yet to be heard about budget padding 2024. “We therefore call on the President of the Senate to immediately step aside for a thorough investigation of the allegation of budget padding against him and his office within 14 days.
The Conference of Nigerian Political Parties, CNPP and a coalition of civil society groups say it is time this lingering issue of budget padding, which they consider a form of political corruption that misappropriate funds for social and economic development be settled and rested for once.
In a note sent to THEWILL, Deputy National Publicity Secretary of CNPP, Comrade James Ezema, and the National Secretary of the coalition of CSOs, Alhaji Ali Abacha, the umbrella association of registered political parties and political associations in collaboration with the civil society groups, stated that the President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, should step aside for proper investigation to be done on the matter.
“In an event that he remains in office, we also call on all Senators of good conscience to rise to the occasion and commence impeachment process against Senator Akpabio after our 14 days ultimatum to pave way for an unhindered investigation of the allegation against him as Senator Akpabio cannot be a judge in his own case,” they said.
They called on President Bola Tinubu “to stand on his feet and end the era of budget padding in the country by prevailing on Senator Akpabio to leave office for proper investigation as the presidency in a statement signed by the President’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, inadvertently admitted that there was a budget padding to the tune of over N1 trillion when he claimed that President Tinubu presented N27.5 trillion budget to the National Assembly, but N28.7 trillion was passed; and this proves that there is merit in the allegation as what was passed was not what was presented to the National Assembly.
“So, if our demands are not met, we will have no other choice than to mobilise our members, all other civil society organisations, human rights activists, opinion leaders, political parties, men and women of good will and conscience, and all hungry citizens to occupy the National Assembly until our demands are met”, the CNPP and the Coalition of CSOs stated.
BudgiT’s Onigbinde said that President Tinubu has to put his foot down on what should be allowed or disallowed in the budget.
“The President needs to step in. This is a brazen attempt not to make development happen. And he has to come up with a political solution. I don’t think a legislative solution is a way out of this, I believe the budget, being a law, can be amended and tweaked by the National Assembly. The President has to set a cap on what can be inserted in the budget, that would be a political solution,” he said.
About the Author
Amos Esele is the Deputy Editor of THEWILL Newspaper. He has over two decades of experience on the job.
