Senate halts probe into ₦9.995tr 2024 budget capital component
In a dramatic Senate session marked by heated debates, impassioned pleas, and mounting frustration, the Nigerian Senate leadership on Tuesday blocked a motion looking out for to compare the federal authorities’s failure to place into effect the ₦9.995 trillion capital component of the ₦28.777 trillion 2024 nationwide funds.
No subject bipartisan requires accountability and transparency over the funds’s non-implementation, the session ended with out a vote on the proposed probe, a resolution attributed to the intervention of Deputy Senate President, Senator Jibrin Barau, who presided over the session.
The capital component of the 2024 Appropriation Act, in the origin scheduled to expire on June 30, 2025, was slated for amendment due to delays in the execution of its capital initiatives. Senator Olamilekan Adeola, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, offered the 2024 Appropriation Act (Modification) Invoice 2025 (SB.854), looking out for to elongate the lifespan of the capital component by one more six months, to December 31, 2025.
Adeola argued that the extension was considerable to enable Ministries, Departments, and Companies (MDAs) enough time to utilise the clean capital funds already launched fully. He emphasised that some necessary initiatives risked being abandoned if the extension was now not authorized.
“There may be a need for additional extension for the funds to be fully and judiciously expended… This bill, due to this truth, presents for the extension… to thirty first December 2025,” Adeola acknowledged whereas urging swift passage.
Then again, a twist by surprise emerged, to the extent that senators began to push for a necessary investigation to solve the motive on the lend a hand of the failed funds implementation.
Whereas no senator opposed the extension in precept, many voiced deep dissatisfaction over the authorities’s failure to place into effect the capital component, a failure considered as undermining every the govt.’s credibility and the legislature’s authority.
Senate Minority Chief, Senator Abba Moro (Benue South), supported the extension reluctantly, warning that ongoing delays had heart-broken contractors and jeopardised future initiatives.
“Unless we decide it seriously with the Ministry of Finance, this Parliament will change into a humiliation to itself,” Moro cautioned.
Prone Bayelsa Voice Governor, Senator Seriake Dickson (Bayelsa West), lamented the paralysis of authorities operations, blaming political distractions and uncomfortable fiscal prioritisation.
“The recurrent component has been fully applied, but now not the capital, the percentage that advantages Nigerians. Contractors are unpaid, initiatives are stalled, and but we’re informed there’s money,” Dickson acknowledged, calling for a proper probe by the Senate committees on Appropriation and Finance.
Echoing Dickson’s concerns, Senator Abdul Ningi (Bauchi Central) warned of eroding public belief in the authorities’s promises. He suggested that the leadership of the National Assembly ought to for my half meet with the President to deal with the fiscal deadlock.
“We’re being taken for a swagger. This authorities has to come and explain in self assurance to Nigerians what's occurring,” Ningi asserted, noting that the implementation of the 2025 funds had now not even commenced.
No subject overwhelming red meat up for an investigative motion, the session took a pointy flip when Deputy Senate President Jibrin Barau refused to position the subject to a vote.
“Even supposing we must now not happy the attach we are, issues are planned effectively in the ardour of the nation,” Barau said, brushing off the rising requires accountability.
In location of initiating a proper investigation, Barau redirected the accountability to the Senate committees on Appropriations and Finance, claiming they were already empowered below Senate rules to look into such matters.
