Chairman, Senate Committee on Appropriations, Jubrin Barau, has said November 28 deadline to lay the report on the appropriation bill at Senate plenary remains sacrosanct to the committee.
The President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, had directed the appropriations committee to receive the budgets from the committees work on them and submit a detailed budget for the consideration of the senate at on November 28.
Although some committees are still entertaining some of the ministries departments and agencies on the budget, Barau in chat with select reporters said it would not affect nor delay the completion of its committee from tidying the budget for the senate to receive and deliberate upon both at plenary and the committee of supply respectively by the stipulated date of November 28.
According to him, the committee on appropriations which he heads has started to receive and considering some reports from the various committees which have completed their task ahead of others.
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He insisted that his committee would meet up with the deadline.
The committee on appropriations has received reports from three committees already out of the 68 total committees of the Senate.
These are: Senate Committee on Capital Market, Cooperation & Integration and Privatisation had defended and submitted their reports for the consideration of the Senate on Wednesday before the close of business of the day.
Lawan had on Monday, reiterated the determination of the National Assembly to pass the budget before the Christmas break.
He had said: “Our target for tomorrow, the 29th of October, as the last day for budget defence remains.
“We hope that from this week, the 30th of October to the 5th of November; we expect all our sub-committees of the appropriations committee to defend their budgets before the appropriation committees of the Senate and the House.
“We are desirous and determined to ensure that the budget is laid on the 28th of November this year. We want to ensure that we pass the budget before the end of this year by December when we will go for Christmas break,” Lawan had stated.