Skip to main content

Nigerian Senate passes INEC N189bn election budget

Today, the Nigerian Senate passed the sum of N234 billion for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in the 2018 budget. 



The figure comprises the N189 billion requested by INEC for the conduct the 2019 general election, and N45 billion provided for the commission under statutory transfer. The lawmakers approved that the N189 billion be vired from both recurrent and capital components of the Special Intervention Programme captured in the Service Wide Vote of the 2018 Appropriation Act. 



The passage of the budget followed the presentation of the report of the Committee on Appropriation chaired by Sen. Danjuma Goje who said that the committee considered President Muhammadu Buhari’s request for N242 billion for INEC and security agencies to conduct the election. 



He said the executive allocated N143 billion for INEC from virement in the 2018 budget without specifying the source of the virement. The committee, according to him, recommended that the money be vied from the Special Intervention Programme under the Service Wide Vote of the 2018 Appropriation Act. Goje said in making the recommendation, the committee took into account report of the Joint Senate and House of Representatives Committee on INEC which met with the commission during the just-ended National Assembly recess. 



He said the final report that would cover the security agencies’ components of the N242 billion election’s budget would be presented in the next legislative day. Commenting on the report, the Deputy President of the Senate, Ike Ekweremadu, observed that Buhari’s letter to the Senate on election funding came holistically, comprising the requests of INEC and the security agencies. 

“The issue of INEC has been settled, and we are told that the Committee on Appropriation will be meeting with the security agencies this afternoon.

This being an interim report, I would like to suggest this report and the report on the request of the security agencies be consolidated into one report, more so when it came as a single report from the president.

This is important so that we have a single report next week and be able to pass it as a single request, because if we separate it now it will cause confusion.’’ 

However, other senators, including Kabiru Gaya, Ahmed Lawan and Ibrahim Gobir, countered Ekweremadu and called for immediate passage of the INEC budget due to its urgency. The President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, thereafter put the committee’s recommendations to a voice vote and it was approved by the lawmakers

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Hurricane Hits Texas, One Person Reported Dead

Hurricane Harvey hit Texas as a Category 4 storm on Friday, battering the coast with 130-mph winds and torrential rain. It was the strongest hurricane to hit the United States in more than a decade leaving a massive destruction, loss of electricity, wrecked buildings and has so far killed at least one person. Scroll down to see more pictures of the incident:
Post a Comment
Read more

Togo prime Minister Komi Klassou resigns

Togo’s prime minister and his government have resigned, the West African nation’s presidency said late Friday. President Faure Gnassingbe congratulated prime minister Komi Selom Klassou and his team for their “economic, political and social efforts and the encouraging results despite the health crisis around the world”, a statement on the presidency’s official website said. Togo has been due for a political reshuffle since Gnassingbe was reelected in February for a fourth term in office, but changes were delayed by the coronavirus pandemic. The president’s election win, which came after a constitutional change allowing him to run, extended more than a half-century of dynastic rule over the former French colony by the Gnassingbe family. The victory was disputed by the main opposition challenger, who has faced official harassment in the wake of the vote. The president has led the country of eight million people since taking over in 2005 following the death of his father Gnass...
Post a Comment
Read more

Kenyan Law Court dismisses case of man seeking compensation after his wife eloped with another man from hospital

  A lawsuit filed by a man seeking to be compensated by St Mary's Mission Hospital in Kenya for allowing his wife to leave the hospital with another man after giving birth, has been struck out by a law court.    The appellant had sued the St. Mary's Mission hospital at Kakamega law courts in 2020 seeking general damages from the facility on grounds that the hospital had discharged his wife and allowed her to leave with another man. After delivering and at the time of discharge, the wife of the appellant claimed he was the baby's father.   The court of appeal judges Patrick Kiage, Mumbi Ngugi and Francis Tuiyott sitting at the Kisumu Court of Appeal, empathized with the man, but disagreed that he (the appellant) be compensated by the hospital for not detaining his wife.  They upheld the lower court's judgement which added that there's no remedy that lies in the law for such grievances.   Kiage said;   "I agree that if a man takes the woman he loves to t...
Post a Comment
Read more