2016 Budget: Amaechi does not understand the document – lawmaker

– Abdulmumin Jibrin is a lawmaker who took part in the securitisation of the 2016 budget submitted to the National Assembly

– He has dismissed claims that lawmakers distorted the budget and removed the Calabar-Lagos rail project from it

– Jibrin claimed that the executive arm of the government and the minister of transport do not understands the document

Abdulmumin Jibrin, the chairman of the federal House of Representatives committee on appropriation, has dismissed claims that lawmakers distorted the 2016 budget and removed the Calabar-Lagos rail project from it.

He noted that on the contrary the House had helped the executive arm of government to regularize and correct the budget.

Jibrin stated this during an interview with Channels Television on Monday, April 11.

“I do not believe that the executive arm of government really understands the document they sent to the National Assembly, or they have even studied what we sent back to them.

“I have every reason to draw such a conclusion. In the first place, you saw all the confusion, from the point of preparing the budget to the controversy of bringing the budget to the National Assembly, to accusations of trying to pull it out of the National Assembly through subterranean means.

READ ALSO: 2016 budget: Buhari holds talks with Saraki

“Then again, the president bringing another version to the National Assembly. And that very new version was what head of Ministries Department and Agencies, Ministers and the rest came to the National Assembly to disown.

“So if you want to look at it from that angle, you’ll say they don’t even have a budget,” he concluded.

According to Jibrin, Rotimi Amaechi, the minister of transport, also does not understand the document.

“Now, I give you an example. Why I am giving you this background is for you to understand when a statement comes from that part of the government, we should begin to think, do they even understand the document?

“Yesterday’s evening, the same minister of transport was still arguing with the speaker at the presidential villa that the Calabar-Lagos rail project was included in the budget. It tells you he does not understand the budget,” he said.

Speaking about the confusion surrounding the document, Jibrin wondered why the whole responsibility was taken away from the budget office, while only its “director general was used as a scapegoat”.

READ ALSO: Lagos to Calabar railway was not in 2016 budget – Ashafa

“Now they want to use the National Assembly as a second scapegoat and we are saying no. You can’t use us. We are not part of it.

“You created all the confusion there. We have helped you to manage it but again, when you try to drag us into that, we are not going to accept it,” he stressed.

Jibrin revealed that the committee discovered that the total sum of the ministry of transport was poorly calculated, and he blamed it on the task force.

“The budget was overblown by 54 billion Naira. In the line items, there was nothing like Calabar-Lagos. What we have was Lagos-Kano, a rail line from the southern part of the country to the northern part. It was underfunded and we took a portion of that 54 billion to complete Lagos-Kano rail project so that we can be done with that. And now, with the total amount we have for that project, it can be completed,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Senate has reacted to the controversy trailing the removal of some projects including the Lagos-Calabar rail line from the 2016 budget.

Senator Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi, the chairman of Senate committee on media and public affairs, said that Lagos-Calabar rail project was not included in the budget proposal presented to the National Assembly by President Muhammadu Buhari. He also challenged anyone who has any evidence to the contrary to present such to Nigerians.

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