Posted by By JAMES OJO, Abuja on
House of Representatives has given indication that it will review the $53.8 benchmark on which President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua predicated the 2008 budget to make it realistic.
House of Representatives has given indication that it will review the $53.8 benchmark on which President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua predicated the 2008 budget to make it realistic.
Although, he did not mention the new benchmark, Chairman, Appropriation Committee of the House, Hon. Festus Adegoke said at the weekend that the need for the upward review of the benchmark stemmed from interactive sessions with the relevant government ministries, parastatals and agencies by a cross section of lawmakers.
Already, eight sub committees had been named to work with the appropriation committee to ease the pressures of work and to make the target date of passing the budget a reality.
Hon. Adegoke, who was accompanied by his counterpart in the Rules and Business as well as Media and Publicity, Hon Ita Enang and Ezuiche Ubani respectively pointed out that the sub committee would help to address various key sectors that have not been touched in the 2008 Budget proposals.
As at the close of general debate on the principles of the budget, he noted that the federal legislators had interacted with officials of the Ministry of Finance, Revenue Mobilization and Fiscal Allocation Commission, Federal Inland Revenue Services (FIRS), Customs and NNPC among others.
'Since last week, we have been having interactive sessions with officials of the Ministry of Finance, relevant agencies, exchanging notes on the 2008 budget. Just about two or three days ago, there was a meeting, it was all encompassing. The FIRS, the Revenue Mobilization and Fiscal Allocation Commission, the NNPC and the Customs and we were able to rub minds together," he said.
He said that after the interactions, if there was need to take some issues to the floor of the House for debate. The committee would not hesitate to do so, adding that the review of the benchmark was one of the areas that have not been touched, as far as the proposal was concerned.
'I can assure you of the fact that negotiation is still on and I believe that before the end of next
week (this week), a realistic benchmark would have been arrived at, which will be able to help solve some problems mentioned on the floor of the House.
'So, the issue of benchmark will be resolved, by the special grace of God, by next week (this week). You can be rest assured of the fact that we are there as the mouth piece of the people", he assured.
Adegoke noted that the House of Representatives has made a lot of progress regarding the issue of the budget proposals, saying that all the Chairmen and Deputy-Chairmen of the various committees of the House have been barred from traveling outside the country until the budget is passed.
He explained that the chairmen of committees have only two weeks to invite the various Ministers and Heads of government parastatals under them for the purpose of defending their budgetary allocations and that it would just be normal for them to be around to effectively to do so.
He said that the collation and consideration of the reports of the various committees on the budget have been slated for between 14th and 17th December, while the report would be presented to the House on December 20 for the third reading and passage.