So, padding is alive and well
Nigerians watching the event on television could not believe their eyes and ears on Tuesday when Minister of Power, Works and Housing Mr. Babatunde Raji Fashola disowned a N2 billion provision in his ministry’s budget, saying he did not know anything about it. Fashola, who was defending the housing aspect of his ministry’s 2017 […]
Nigerians watching the event on television could not believe their eyes and ears on Tuesday when Minister of Power, Works and Housing Mr. Babatunde Raji Fashola disowned a N2 billion provision in his ministry’s budget, saying he did not know anything about it. Fashola, who was defending the housing aspect of his ministry’s 2017 budget before the Senate Committee on Lands, Housing and Urban Development, said it was the Ministry of Finance that inserted the provision.
The minister had been asked by Committee chairman Senator Barnabas Gemade (APC, Benue) about the provision of N2 billion in the Housing Ministry’s budget for “Regional Housing Scheme.” The project is tagged FMOWP99934089. Gemade asked a series of questions; “What is this provision of N2billion for? What is regional housing scheme? Where is it taking place? What is happening? Have you seen it on Page 18?” Fashola however said, “It is not our project… It is a Ministry of Finance initiative. They are saying that they want to do what they called … It is not from us.” He also said, “That is what has come. I am explaining to you now, sir, on how it comes into our budget. That is not what we submitted. We didn’t submit that proposal.”
The committee chairman then said that Minister of Finance Mrs Kemi Adeosun would be invited to explain how the money got into the Housing budget. Her appearance before Gemade’s committee should be hastened because the budget defence session is only just starting and we have fears that the revelation before Gemade’s committee may be only the tip of a very large iceberg. If the Finance Ministry could smuggle two billion naira for a project into a ministry’s project without the minister responsible being aware of it, then there is reason to suspect that many other items were smuggled into the budgets of other ministries and agencies as well.
This was exactly the notorious practice, later christened “padding,” that made such a big mess of and caused so much delay in the approval of the 2016 federal budget. One after another ministers appeared before legislative committees and denied knowledge of whole sections of “their” budgets. President Muhammadu Buhari later blamed civil servants for padding the budget and inserting frivolous items into it. In addition, former chairman of the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee Abdulmumin Jibrin later accused the National Assembly’s principal officers of padding up budget figures, though he only said so after he was sacked. The presidency later said it punished some Budget Office officials for padding the budget.
To now hear that this ugly practice is still very much around is very disturbing indeed. It speaks about the sloppiness and confusion that attends to the Executive’s budget preparation process that a minister will see a hefty provision in his budget for the first time when he appears before a legislative committee. The questions all Nigerians are asking are, was this budget not discussed at the Federal Executive Council [FEC]? Didn’t ministers get to see it there? Don’t ministers have copies of their ministries’ budgets before they appear for budget defence? How many more ministers are now going to appear before legislative committees, only to disown parts or all of their budgets?
If what happened last year were to happen again this year, it means we are in for another messy round of budget defence and for another prolonged delay in passing the federal budget. This, when the country is in the throes of a deep economic recession and all hopes are pinned on the quick passage of a federal budget to enable us spend our way out of the recession as quickly as possible. Whoever did this padding is about to inflict grave economic injury on this country. He or she should be fished out quickly and severely dealt with.