TheCable

Abdulmumin Jibrin, chairman of the federal house of representatives committee on appropriation, says Rotimi Amaechi, minister of transport, does not understand his budget.

Speaking in an interview with Channels Television, Jibrin said the executive arm of government does not even have a budget.

“Let me say this very straight, I do not believe that the executive arm of government really understands the document they sent to the national assembly, or they have even studied what we sent back to them,” he said.

“I have every reason to draw such a conclusion. In the first place, you saw all the confusion, from the point of preparing the budget to the controversy of bringing the budget to the national assembly, to accusations of trying to pull it out of the national assembly through subterranean means.

“Then again, the president bringing another version to the national assembly. And that very new version was what head of MDAs, ministers and the rest came to the national assembly to disown.

“So if you want to look at it from that angle, you’ll say they don’t even have a budget.”

Jubrin added that Ameachi was still arguing on Sunday over a budget he does not even understand, emphasising that Calabar-Lagos rail was never in the budget.

“When a statement come from that part of government, we should begin to think, do they even understand the document?

“Yesterday evening, the same minister of transport, was still arguing with speaker at the presidential villa, that the Calabar-Lagos rail was included in the budget.

“What does that tell you? It tells you that he doesn’t even understand his budget. We having a serious situation.

“Ordinarily, we would not have raised this issue in public, but this is an executive arm of government that never had a budget, had issues, blamed it on the legislative arm.”

He said some ministers were appointed weeks before the budget was prepared and tried change everything the permanent secretaries and civil servants had done.