SENATE APPROVES $1.53BN LOAN FOR FG

 The Senate on Tuesday commenced the consideration of the 2011 Appropriation Bill amid reservations that the 2011 budget may also follow the routine pattern of poor implementation by the executive arm of government.
This was even as the Senate approved the request of President Goodluck Jonathan to enable the Federal Government borrow foreign loan of $1.537 billion out of the $3.702 billion from development partners for the provision of infrastructure in the country.

In their consideration of the general principles of the 2011 Appropriation Bill, Senators that contributed to the debate opined that the delay and late arrival of the budget could affect its implementation.
In his lead debate, Senate Leader, Senator Teslim Folarin urged members of the upper chamber of the National Assembly to support the bill to enable the executive arm of government begin the implementation of the budget in good time next year.

Contributing to the debate on the 2011 Appropriation Bill, Deputy Senate Leader, Senator Victor Ndoma-Egba said while attention had been focused on the National Assembly’s recurrent expenditure, the real issue remained the high cost of running governance across all levels of government.
Senator Ndoma-Egba stressed that even when there was an improvement in the capital budget and a reduction in the recurrent expenditure, poor implementation of the budget would negatively defeat the efforts to reach the poor in the country.

According to Senator Ndoma-Egba: “We now cannot say for certain when the budget will start. We have had 10 budgets since this democratic dispensation but we are yet to get a proper manner of getting the budget started from January to December.”
In his contribution, Senator Ahmed Lawan (ANPP Yobe) said the deliberate and late presentation of the 2011 budget proposal to the National Assembly was a clear signal that the budget might be on its way to failure as has become consistent with the Peoples Democratic Party(PDP) -led Federal Government.
Senator Lawan further said President Jonathan’s job creation proposal of N50 billion came without clear indications on how jobs would be created, stressing that a conducive environment was needed to protect investors and ensure that jobs were created.

According to Senator Lawan: “This National Assembly must follow every expenditure to ensure that what is provided in the budget is implemented. This is December and we received the budget on December 15. With this, the stage is set for the failure of the budget.”
Senator Lawan, who is the Senate Committee Chairman on Public Accounts said it was important for Nigerians to know that the agencies of government that failed to implement their budgets were responsible for the failure of the country.

In his own contribution, Senator Osita Izunaso (PDP Imo) disagreed with some of his colleagues, saying the National Assembly should be blamed for its poor oversight over the agencies that led to poor performance of the budget.
Senator Izunaso said it was time the National Assembly made plans to ensure periodic publication of budget implementation by agencies of government adding that “If we keep allowing the agencies to continue the way they are going, they will come back again to say we should shift the goalpost and ask us for extension to March the following year.”

Senator Izunaso therefore called on President Jonathan to work towards the production of a template for the implementation of the 2011 budget.
Speaking in the same vein, Senator Nkechi Nwaogu (PDP Abia) said it was time the National Assembly increased the tempo of its oversight of government agencies as a guarantee for effective budget implementation, even as she decried the absence of details of the budget, a development she noted could hamper the speedy and thorough treatment of the estimates.

Also contributing, former governor of Yobe State, Senator Bukar Ibrahim urged the Senate to go ahead to further reduce the recurrent expenditure of all Federal agencies with a view to increasing the capital budget for the benefit of ordinary Nigerians.
In her own submission, Senator Chris Anyanwu (PDP Imo), expressed concerns over the non-presentation of the details of the budget in addition to the incidences of poor budget implementation by the Executive arm of Government.

Presiding at plenary, Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, said debates on the budget would continue on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Senate Chief Whip Senator Mahmud Kanti Bello, while presenting the interim report of the joint Committees on Finance and National Planning, Economic Affairs and Poverty Alleviation that worked on the details of the foreign loan request of the Federal Government, said that the Joint Committees was unable to consider the sum of one billion US dollars from the People’s Republic of China for Abuja Light Railway and Lagos-Ibadan Railway Modernization projects.

Senator Bello explained that the Committees rejected the consideration of the One billion Chinese loan giving the fact that the terms and conditions of the loan are currently under negotiation. In the same vein, the Senate Joint Committees according to Senator Bello was unable to consider the request by some State Governments as a result of the failure of the Federal Ministry of Finance to provide information on the breakdown of the loan requested for by the States and as provided by Section 42(1) of the Fiscal Responsibility Act. The Federal Government had in its request, said that it set aside $200 million for the financing of Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) and for infrastructure financing with a view to create a long term finance market out of which $150 million is for on lending to viable projects sponsors/concessionaires for 15 to 25 years.

The government further said that $50 million of the amount will be channeled to viability gap fund (VGF) as upfront capital projects that are commercially viable even as it equally requested for $115 million out of which $83 million is for ?provision of technical assistance, transaction advisory services while $32 ?million is for capacity building for 14 critical Ministries, Departments and ?Agencies for 27 concessions considered as priority projects.