From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja
House of Representatives has jerked up the 2023 budget to N21,827,188,747,391 from the N20.51 trillion proposal presented to the joint session of the National Assembly by President Muhammadu Buhari on October 7.
The figure represented an increase of N1,319,246 ,566,677 from the initial proposal presented to the parliament by the President.
This followed the consideration and adoption of the report of the House Committee on Appropriation at yesterday’s plenary.
The House had last week deferred passage of the 2023 Appropriation Bill to yesterday.
Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila, who announced the deferment said: “There are some things that need to be done. We would adjourn till Wednesday when we would now pass the budget and close for the year.”
A breakdown of the budget indicated that N967,486,010,536 was for statutory transfers; N6,557,597,611,797 would go for debt servicing; N8,329,370,195,637 was appropriated for recurrent (non-debt) expenditure while N5,972,734,929,421 is for contribution to the development fund for capital expenditure for the 2023 fiscal year. Also, the Niger-Delta Development Commission (NDDC) got N119,939,603,660; Universal Basic Education (UBE)N103,288,086,976; N173,635,157,400 was appropriated for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC); and N4,500,000,000 for National Human Right Commission.
Similarly, under capital expenditure for Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) defence got N285,045,254,555; Presidency, N20,115,392,458; Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, Disaster Management and Social Development, N282,902,715,000; Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, N248,358,725,889; Ministry of Interior N45,622,057,393; Federal Ministry of Police Affairs, N60,649,679,826; Federal Ministry of Aviation, N49,410,546,777; Federal Ministry of Power N56,144,375,197.
Also, the Federal Ministry of Education got N153,735,618,395; Federal Ministry of Health, N134,909,210,815; Federal Ministry of Environment Headquarters , N21,257,480,084.