Why Jonathan Is Yet To Sign 2014 Budget – Maku

The Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku, has stated on Wednesday that President Goodluck Jonathan’s delay in signing the 2014 Budget is as a result of misrepresentations made by two chambers of the National Assembly, on the Appropriation Bill that was sent to them.

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Minister of Information, Labaran Maku

He explained that these misrepresentations are very serious and could lead to a lot of adverse effects on the implementation of the budget, and therefore needed to be treated with great care, hence the need for the Executive to prevent mistakes.

Maku made this known while addressing newsmen in the State House after a weekly Federal Executive Council meeting which was presided over by President Goodluck Jonathan.

He also expressed his grief that the Federal Government is still operating without a budget when the year is already half gone, adding that the Ministry of Finance is holding a meeting with members of the National Assembly as part of efforts to check and reconcile the differences in the proposed Bill and the document passed into law.

Maku assured that the reconciliation exercise will be concluded soon and the signing of the budget would commence thereafter.

“The Minister of Finance briefed us today at the FEC relating to the progress on the budget. It is very sad that we have almost entered the middle of the year and we don’t have a budget.

“This indeed is sad that the budget has taken so long in coming and practically we have less than seven months to execute the budget.

“We will do everything possible to reconcile the few differences that emerged ‎in what was transmitted to the government by the national Assembly.

“There are few areas of distortions and they are those areas that are very serious and we think there is a need to look into them because of the negative impact those distortions may have on the implementation of the budget.

“There is a lot of conversation going on now between the Federal Ministry of Finance and the National Assembly on these issues. And very shortly we believe that we are going to reconcile those areas and then the final budget will be announced to the nation by the President” He said.

The 2014 budget of N4.695 trillion for the new financial year was passed by the House of Representatives on April 10, 2014, Thursday.

The budget was passed based on the estimated oil price of $77.5 per barrel while crude oil production was set at the rate of 2.3883 million barrels per day.