Senate Joint Committees begin sitting on 2021-2023 MTEF/FSP

The Senate Joint Committees on Finance and National Planning will next week begin legislative work on the 2021-2023 Medium Term Expenditure Framework(MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper, preparatory to presentation of 2021 Appropriation Bill by President Mohammadu Buhari.

Senator representing Lagos West senatorial district and Chairman Senate Committee on Finance, Solomon Adeola made the disclosure in a statement on Thursday.

Nigerian Tribune findings revealed that the President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan had in July mandated the Joint Committees of Finance and National Planning to work on the 2021-2023 Medium Term Expenditure Framework(MTEF) and Fiscal Strategy Paper, after receiving same from President Buhari.

Senator Adeola in a statement made available to newsmen by his media aide, Kayode Odunaro said “the Joint Committees will begin to critically interrogate the document from Wednesday next week with a view of presenting recommendations for the Senate passage of the document.”

The Joint Committees which have since sent invitations to Ministries, Departments and Agencies(MDAs) and Government Owned Enterprises(GOEs) said “there is need for thorough scrutiny of the MTEF/FSP document in view of the fluid dynamics of the world economy following the disruptive impact of COVID-19 pandemic and the vagaries of the international market for crude oil and its attendant effects on our sources of revenue.

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“There is need for all stake holders to come together to critically study the fundamentals of the “new normal” forced on the global economy by the COVID-19 pandemic. With the instability witnessed in the price of crude oil at the international market and the sluggish world economy with some nation falling into recession, there is need to assess our situation critically with a view of being realistic about our revenues sources for budgets going forward.”

Senator Adeola further maintained that there was need to examine the rationale for pegging the price of crude oil at $40 per barrel and a projected crude oil production of 1.86 million barrels per day (mbpd).

“We are kick starting the process on Wednesday with Government Owned Enterprises(GOEs) like NNPC, NCC, NPA, Custom Service, NIMASA, DPR and others followed by the Ministry of Finance and its agencies and subsequently all revenue generating agencies.”

The statement appealed to all heads of MDAs to come fully prepared with rationales for their positions as he maintained that “the Joint Committee intends to present the report of the Joint Committee to the Senate immediately on resumption after recess to be in tandem with the achieved budget cycle of January- December of the 2020 Budget before the disruption of COVID-19.”

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