Buhari Rejects NASS Peace Deal on Budget

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has rejected the peace moves with the executive over the 2016 budget. According to what the Punch gathered, the National Assembly had, as part of the peace moves reached out to the executive and asked President Buhari to sign the document and then send a supplementary budget to the law makers.

It was gathered that the president did not accept the suggestion against the backdrop that the distortions in the budget discovered in the document transmitted by the National Assembly were too many.

A minister who confided in the Punch, said that both arms of government had been discussing the issue, but the President had been advised by members of his cabinet not to sign the appropriation bill.

“The National Assembly has initiated some peace moves. The lawmakers have suggested that the budget should be signed by the President before he will send a supplementary budget to cover the omissions, but he had turned down the proposal”, a competent source told a correspondent on Sunday.

It was gathered that the President on Sunday afternoon met behind closed doors with the Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and the Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udo Udoma, in consultation on the budget.

The meeting was held inside the President’s official residence in the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

The meeting was held shortly before Buhari left Abuja for China on a one-week official visit.

It was learnt that the meeting was a follow-up to an earlier one held by the President with the leadership of the National Assembly.

When contacted, the Senate Leader, Ali Ndume, on Sunday, said he was not aware of any meeting between the leadership of the National Assembly and the Presidency over the 2016 budget.

Senate spokesman, Senator Abdullahi Sabi, said in Abuja that the constitution of Nigeria did not make the legislature a rubber stamp. He also added that the National Assembly, in reality, helped the executive to pass a badly written budget, saying having done its job within the law, the lawmakers expected the executive to follow the constitutional process.