We can’t implement 2016 budget fully –FG

The Federal Government has ruled out the possibility of full implementation of the 2016 Appropriation Act signed into law by President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday.

The Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udo Udoma, stated this while briefing journalists shortly after Buhari signed the budget at the President Villa, Abuja.

Udoma was joined at the briefing by the Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed.

Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Hajiya Zainab Ahmed

The minister admitted that having been signed late into the year, it would be impossible to achieve full implementation of the budget.

He said, “Our own will always be 100 per cent implementation. We know that because we started late, we may not achieve it but that is our aim.

“We will start off with that aim because the budget is a law so we will try and implement it as faithfully as we can. However, the reality is that we may not (achieve it) because we started late.

“In subsequent years, we will start earlier to give us a better chance of implementing the budget in full. But we will do our best.”

The minister also said the government would work hard to ensure that the National Assembly gets the 2017 budget proposal by October so that it could be passed before the end of the year.

This, he said, would afford the government the opportunity of implementing from January to December.

The minister said, “Two weeks ago, the ministry presented a memo to the Federal Executive Council and got approval for a timetable for the budget. So, as we are finishing with this budget, we are starting on 2017.

“Our intention is that the budget should reach the National Assembly early in October to give them enough time to pass it before the end of the year.

“The most important time for road construction is the dry season. So, if you can get the budget in December, you can now start early to implement. Our intention is to get us back to a situation where we can have a full January to December implementation for the budget.

“We are working hard on the timetable to achieve this. It is also going to be much more extensive consultation with the National Assembly prior to the budget being presented, extensive consultations with non-governmental organisations NGOs that will help us to speed up the process of getting the budget approved.”

Giving more details on the signed budget, Udoma said the budget size that the legislature came out with was just slightly lower figure than the one submitted by the executive.

He said the revenue assumption from the budget as passed by the National Assembly was the same, having adopted the same $38 crude oil price.

The minister also said the size of the budget and size of the deficit were about the same.

According to him, the budget puts the production figure at 2.2million barrels per day.

Ahmed on her part recalled that two weeks ago, the Federal Executive Council approved a monitoring and evaluation framework which was meant to guide the implementation of the budget.

She said, “We have developed a specific implementation guideline for the 2016 budget which will be submitted to all the ministries departments and agencies.

“This will be vigorously monitored and reported upon on quarterly basis to the FEC. There are some checks in that implementation plan and we intend to follow through with the plan as fast as possible.”