The Presidency last night blamed the
delay in submitting the supplementary budget, containing the Independent
National Electoral Commission (INEC) estimates for the 2019 general
election, to the National Assembly on the late passage of the 2018
budget by the federal legislature.....
A statement by the Senior Special
Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Malam Garba Shehu,
denied the allegation by the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, that the
executive sent the INEC budget several months after INEC submitted it to
the executive.
Saraki’s media aide, Mr. Olu Onemola,
responded yesterday, saying the presidency’s excuse was an afterthought,
adding that President Muhammadu Buhari was not committed to the general
election.
However, Shehu insisted that Saraki
should rather be blamed for putting the country under tension in
relation to INEC’s budget and the preparation for 2019 polls.
He said the INEC budget did not come to
the executive until after the presentation of the 2018 budget and hence,
could only come later as a supplementary budget.
Furthermore, he said supplementary
budget could only be submitted after the passage of the main budget and
since the budget was delayed for seven months by the National Assembly,
it couldn’t have been submitted earlier.
The statement read: “The presidency
wishes to respond to the false to accusations by Senator Saraki who
alleged that President Buhari is to blame for the delay in approving the
supplementary budget for INEC.
“On the contrary, the Senate President
should look into the mirror and what he will see is his own face. He is
solely to be held responsible for deliberately driving the nation to
this cliff edge as far as the preparations for next elections are
concerned.
“It is not true that INEC submitted their draft budget to the presidency in February.
“No, it came much later but even then, this is not the real
issue.
The fact that their proposals came well
after the president had laid his budget for the year 2018 before the
National Assembly meant that their own will be sent as supplementary
budget. This was clearly stated to them by the Minister of Budget and
National Planning.
“A supplementary budget cannot be
submitted until the main budget is passed, and so the delay in passing
the main budget was the reason for the delay. The National Assembly
passed the 2018 budget seven months after the document was submitted to
the National Assembly by President Buhari.
“Unless someone has forgotten, the
budget was submitted to the National Assembly and it took the Saraki-led
National Assembly seven months to release it. There is no way President
Buhari could have submitted a supplementary budget while the main one
was still pending.
“It is never done. Because Saraki did
not return the main budget, we could not have submitted the
supplementary one. After the long delays, the President was pained to
sign the much distorted, butchered and debauched document. In giving his
assent, President Buhari said that he was compelled to sign the budget
so as not to keep the economy continuously on a standstill.
“It is also worthy of note that this is
the first time in Nigeria’s history that a government would bring
together the cost of an election in one budget, with each agency
involved invited to defend their portion of the budget before the
National Assembly.
“It is all part of the transparency that
this government is known for. In the past, governments would approve
INEC budgets and funding without a breakdown, often using ways and means
to fund it. Not so under President Buhari.”
It’s an Afterthought, Says Saraki’s Aide
The Special Assistant to the Senate
President on New Media, Onemola, yesterday accused Buhari of not being
committed towards the successful conduct of the 2019 elections in the
country.
Onemola was reacting to the allegation
by Buhari’s Media Organisation that Saraki was slowing down the approval
of the 2019 election budget approval.
Saraki’s aide said in a statement that
President Buhari is desperate to frustrate the conduct of the 2019 polls
by denying the nation the enabling law to conduct the elections.
According to him, the president has refused to assent to the 2018 Electoral Act Amendment Bill passed by the National Assembly.
“The Electoral Bill passed by the
National Assembly to help legalize the various innovations that needed
for free and fair elections is still absent because President Buhari
chose to withhold his assent the first time it was transmitted.
“The question the Buhari Media Organization should ask their principal is: What is he afraid of in the
very progressive proposals contained in the Electoral Bill?; Why does he
want to frustrate the 2019 election by denying the nation the
much-needed enabling law?”
He described the Buhari Media Organization attack on the Senate President as a clear example of
“conscientious ignorance on full display.”
No comments: