TheCable

Seun Onigbinde, director and co-founder of BudgIT, says Abdul Ningi, senator representing Bauchi central, was right if he implied that there was no detailed allocation for N3.7 trillion in the 2024 budget.

Speaking during an interview with Channels Television on Wednesday, Onigbinde said Ningi was however wrong to have said the federal government is running two budgets.

At the weekend, Ningi stirred controversy when he alleged that the 2024 budget was padded by N3 trillion.

The Bauchi senator said “huge damage” has been done to the north and the entire country in the budget.

On Tuesday, the allegations raised by Ningi were debated during plenary at the red chamber, amid a rowdy session.

Subsequently, the senator was suspended for three months.

In December 2023, the two arms of the national assembly passed the 2024 appropriation bill, increasing its size from the N27.5 trillion proposed by President Bola Tinubu, to N28.7 trillion.

Speaking on the development, Onigbinde said there are “statutory elements” in the budget that do not have detailed breakdown.

The BudgIT co-founder said the allocations of the national assembly, National Judicial Council (NJC), Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) and others do not carry detailed breakdown.

He added that Nigerians have the right to know how the money budgeted for the aforementioned entities are being spent.

“Around N2 trillion of the budget presented by the president is the government-owned enterprises budget,” Onigbinde said.

“So, if Senator Ningi says there is a N25 trillion budget, yes, that is the MDA’s budget. It’s different from the government-owned enterprises budget which was now added.

“It is factual that he said that but it doesn’t mean that we are running two concurrent budgets.

“There is a different conversation that those projects should be detailed. TETFUND should not just get an allocation.

“What are you spending the money on? INEC is collecting a huge chunk of funds but there is no public details about what the funds are used for. The same thing with NJC, even the national assembly.

“In the current budget, the national assembly gave a very broad summary of its allocations but there are no detailed allocations on a granular level that everybody can interrogate.

“These are transparency  issues and if you put all these together, that is around N3.5 trillion to N3.7 trillion. So, if that is what he (Ningi) wants to interrogate, there are components of the budget where there is no breakdown. That is very factual.

“But the national assembly needs to push back. We need a breakdown. What is NJC spending money on? We give more money to the NJC and say take it arbitrarily.

“What are they spending that money on? There should be a detailed breakdown to the public. On that point, Senator Ningi is right but to look as if we are running parallel budgets, that is not right.”