By Ikechukwu Okaforadi, Musa Adamu, Christiana Ekpa and Umar Puma
In its bid to oversight the 2018 budget implementation level, the Senate yesterday adjourned its plenary for two weeks to enable the standing committees to commence oversight visits to Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the federal government.
The Senate Leader, Ahmad Lawan (APC, Yobe North), who moved motion for this adjournment, said the chamber will resume plenary on Tuesday, November 6, 2018.
At the end of plenary, the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, explained that the committees are going to carry out the oversight functions, pointing out that it is only plenary session that is being suspended.
Saraki said, “We expect our committees to carry out oversight on the stated areas in this period. Particularly, if you recollect, when we debated the Eurobond, there were a lot of questions on implementation and utilization of those loans.
“But it was because of the expediency and the demand from the Executive that we approved those loans. We did it on the understanding that our committees will quickly go and do oversight in MDAs to see that those funds have been properly utilized.”
On the need to determine how projects in the 2018 budget were being implemented, Saraki said the committees have been instructed to do serious work.
“So, I will charge all our committees that during this period, they should carry out the necessary oversight; so that we can report when we do resume back to plenary. The committees will be meeting till 5th of November,” he added.
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