‘We Will Pass 2016 #Budget Before March Ending’ – Senate Leader

Leader of the Senate, Ali Ndume, on Sunday, February 14, said the Senate would try hard to pass the 2016 Budget before the end of March 2016.

The disclosure is coming on a day Abdulrazak Namdas, the House of Representatives Committee on Media and Public Affairs, averred that the submission of the 2016 budget on February 25 might still be achievable.

Speaking to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Ndume said March was the deadline for the implementation of the 2015 budget, as such it was the desire of the Senate to pass the 2016 budget before that time.



Senator Ndume said that contrary to reports in the media, the Senate did not suspend its passage indefinitely, but only said that the 25th of February `may not be feasible’.

He said: “We have not postponed it indefinitely; we are saying that with the current developments, the February 25 deadline we gave ourselves may not be realistic.

“That is why we now said it is not possible to say we will come back on 25th and say this is the budget; we are not saying that we have suspended it indefinitely.

“The reason we fixed 25th was because we wanted to have a gap of five weeks.”

The Senate Leader said the interval would have enabled the Senate fix whatever issues that needed to be handled before the lapsing of the March 31 deadline for the implementation of the 2015 budget.