Senate passes bills extending 2022 budget implementation to June

By Ikechukwu Okaforadi

The Senate on Tuesday at its plenary passed two bills seeking to extend the implementation of capital components of the 2022 Appropriation bills until June 30.
Senate resolution followed the presentation of two bills, sponsored by Sen. Gobir Abdullahi (APC-Sokoto).
The two sponsored bills were: Bill for an Act to amend the 2022 Appropriation Act and Bill for an Act to amend the 2022 Supplementary Appropriation Act.
Abdullahi in his presentation said the bills seek to amend the 2022 appropriation act and 2022 supplementary appropriation act to extend the implementation year from March 31 to June 30.
He said the National Assembly had extended the implementation of the 2022 appropriation Act from Dec 31 2022 to March 31, 2023.
This, he said was to allow for a full implementation of the budget, given the approval of supplementary budget approved in Dec 2022.
He said the extension had allowed Ministries Department and Agencies (MDAs) to use a large proportion of funds released to them.
He, however, said significant amount of funds remained with MDAs and would require a further extension to be fully extended.
He said given the critical importance of some key projects nearing completion, requested for further extension of the expiration clause in the appropriation act.
He added that the long title explanatory memorandum of the supplementary appropriation act was expedient.
This, he said was to avoid compounding the problem of abandoned projects, given that some of the projects were not provided for in the 2023 budget.
Abdullahi urged the senators to support the bill to allow for full utilisation of capital release to help reflate the economy.