President Goodluck Jonathan on Thursday pleaded with members of the National Assembly to speed up action on the 2014 Appropriation Bill currently before them in order to ensure that his administration delivers dividends of democracy to the people.
The president, who was represented by the Minister of Labour and Productivity, Chief Emeka Wogu, made the appeal in his remarks during a stakeholders forum of the Subsidy Reinvestment and Empowerment Programme held inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
It would be recalled that when debate on the bill entered the second day in the Senate on Wednesday, it encountered stiff opposition from some Peoples Democratic Party and All Progressives Congress senators, who described the document as anti-people.
They also berated the Minister of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, for the way the bill was packaged and therefore called for its review.
President Jonathan specifically appealed to the Chairman of Senate Committee on SURE-P, Senator Abdul Ningi, who attended the event, to help him prevail on his colleagues in the National Assembly to expedite their consideration of the budget.
“Let me appeal to Senator Ningi, who chairs the Senate committee on SURE-P, to please help urge his colleagues in the National Assembly to expedite consideration of the 2014 budget which is currently before them in order for us to continue to deliver dividends of democracy to our people”, he said.
