Senate asks Buhari to hasten 2021 Appropriation Budget

Senate asks Buhari to submit 2021 Appropriation Bill before end of September

…Senate offers to assist the concerned agencies for speedy presentation of next year budget

The Senate President, Ahmad Lawan on Tuesday, appealed to the Presidency to work on the approximations for the 2021 budget to safeguard its appropriate presentation to the National Assembly by the end of September this year.

While giving his remarks on the presentation of President Muhammadu Buhari’s 2021 – 2023 Medium Term Expenditure Framework and Fiscal Strategy Paper to the Senate, Lawan redirected the request to the Senate Committees on Finance; and National Planning for further legislative duties.

The Senate President while addressing both Committees to involve the Ministry of Finance, Budget, and National Planning on the MTEF/FSP Buhari’s application, emphasised the importance of the panel to offer its assistance where required to revenue generating agencies towards meeting expected revenue targets.

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The Committees were also offered four weeks to send feedbacks back to the Senate.

“The request of Mr. President C-in-C is referred to the two committees, Senate Committees on Finance; Budget and National Planning, with Finance as the lead Committee.

“This Senate is giving the Committee four weeks within which to work very closely with the Ministry of Finance, Budget, and National Planning, and particularly engagement with the revenue-generating agencies where we are expecting them to meet their targets.

“We need to ensure that they have all the support that they require from the National Assembly, particularly the Senate to meet their targets.

“Meanwhile, the executive should continue to work on the preparations for the 2021 budget, and by this, we are also equally committed to ensuring that we receive the budget estimates at the end of September and that we are able to consider the budget and get it passed before the end of December to repeat what we did for budget 2020,” Lawan said.