2024 Budget inflated by N3trn, Northern senators allege

SENATOR representing Bauchi Central and Chairman, Northern Senators Forum, Senator Abdul Ningi, has alleged that the 2024 Budget passed by the Red Chamber was inflated.

Senator Ningi made the allegation while speaking with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Hausa Service at the weekend.

The Peoples Democratic Party lawmaker declared that what was passed on the floor of the Senate was N25 Trillion, not N28 Trillion.

Senator Ningi further revealed that lawmakers from the North have engaged consultants to look at the budget and their grievances would be tabled at a meeting with Senate President.

He said: “This is true, for the past three months, we have engaged consultants to review the budget for us. We have some experts that are working on it line by line. We have seen the huge damage that was done not only to the North but the entire country in that budget. We are supposed to sit with the Senate President to inform him about what we have observed.

“We want to show him what we have seen in the budget that is not acceptable, we will not accept them and we don’t want the country to continue spending money on those things. Apart from what the National Assembly did on the floor, there was another budget that was done underground which we didn’t know.

“The new things we have discovered in the budget were not known to us. We haven’t seen them in the budget that was debated and considered on the floor of the National Assembly.

“For example, it was said that there was a budget of N28 trillion but what was passed was N25 trillion. So there is N3 trillion on top. Where are they? Where is it going? So, we need to know this. There are a lot of things. We are coming up with a report and we will show the president himself and ask him if he is aware or not.

“This is what we intended to do. We are to meet the president. We will talk to him about the Mambila power project, Ajaokuta and the River Niger dredging. We will talk to him about the Niger Republic. Recently, they said they will construct a dam, this is not good for us.”

Appraising the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration, Senator Ningi declared that the North is being shortchanged.

“First of all, I want you to know that I am a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and a representative of the people. Based on my opinion, the government hasn’t performed to our expectations. Things are getting worse compared to when President Bola Ahmed Tinubu took the leadership of the country. People are going through a lot of difficulties. We live in villages. We are going there to interact with them and they are lamenting seriously. They have nowhere to go, so they have no one to express their grievances to than us.

“I think Bola Ahmed Tinubu didn’t even understand this country and he didn’t understand the difficulties of ruling a country like Nigeria. Probably, he has his thinking of what governance is, but I don’t blame him so much because when he was campaigning for the seat, there was no agreement or promise between him and the people. People were just blinded and voted for him because he supported former president Muhammadu Buhari when he was contesting. Some even voted for him because he is a Muslim, as such he needed their vote on whether he can or cannot do the right thing for the country.

“But the most painful thing is that Northerners stood for him and did all they could to bring him to power, but unfortunately, there was no agreement between them and the president on what should be done to the North and the Northerners, especially taking into consideration the importance and significant projects that North has been yearning and aspiring to get for a long time. For example, the Ajaokuta project, the Mambila power project, the dredging of River Niger and other notable projects.

“What mostly disturbs my sleep is that we had a budget in 2013 and 2014 in which we earmarked billions of Naira but it was neglected by President Goodluck Jonathan. When President Buhari came, we thought it was one of the projects he would pay attention to, but unfortunately, it wasn’t possible for over eight years. Even road construction like Kano-Abuja is not yet completed, as if it was cursed by someone, despite the road being the soul of our travelers in the North.

“Indeed, we don’t attack the government as the opposition is supposed to do. But this is a result of the situation and the government we have. These so-called leaders they forced on us, were not voted by us. They brought religious issues, and ethnic and tribal issues into the process. They used propaganda saying that no Hausa/Fulani would be trusted to lead the opposition because there would be no peace. If you look at it from this scenario, the majority of those in opposition are from the North-East and the North-West, but we were not allowed to be the leaders of the opposition in the Senate. This is one of the reasons why we said we would go back and look at what is happening under the umbrella of the Northern Senators Forum which is under my leadership. But you can’t do everything here, because it involves members of the ruling and opposition parties. It is very difficult to challenge the ruling party under that umbrella once you want the unity of the North.”